Obituaries
Please alert us to the recent death of any other Rhodes Scholar by emailing communications@rhodeshouse.ox.ac.uk.
Clayton M. Christensen, a professor at Harvard Business School whose groundbreaking 1997 book, “The Innovator’s Dilemma,” outlined his theories about the impact of what he called “disruptive innovation”, died on Thursday at a hospital in Boston. He was 67.
Clayton studied Applied Econometrics at Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar from 1975, graduated from Harvard Business School, and joined the Harvard Business School’s faculty in 1992. For many years he taught a course called “Building and Sustaining a Successful Enterprise.” He focused his theories on a wide range of industries, from education to health care. A former basketball star (he stood 6-foot-8) as well as an affable academic, he focused as much on a life well lived as he did on his management theories.
Francis graduated from Prince Edward H.S. in Salisbury and then the University of Cape Town where he received a B.Sc. and M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering. He then received his Ph.D. in physics from Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar. While at Oxford he was a research associate on Atomic Beams and a Laboratory Instructor - his specialty was in Experimental Atomic Physics and Helium III.
After graduating from Oxford Francis was employed at Yale University in New Haven, Ct., as a researcher in Physics, Associate Professor of physics and was a Junior Faculty Fellowship. Upon leaving Yale, Francis join the Physics faculty at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst and whilst there he was made full professor. Francis was a contributor and co-author of many scientific papers and a member of the American Physical Society.
David Stanley Staiger, aged 91, died peacefully on December 10, 2019, at Glacier Hills Senior Living Facility in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where he lived with his beloved wife, Ann. Dave left Port Huron for a year of college at Michigan State before transferring to the University of Wisconsin, Madison, where he was a three-year varsity letter winner on the football and track teams. A member of Phi Beta Kappa, in his senior year Dave was awarded both the 1951 Big 10 Medal of Honor and a Rhodes Scholarship. That was the year he also met Ann Seibold, whom he married on August 20, 1954. After two years at New College, Oxford, England and two years in the Army in Georgia, Dave spent three years working toward his Ph.D. in economics at MIT under the guidance of Paul Samuelson. He and his family moved to Washington DC in the summer of 1959 to take a job at the Federal Reserve Board, where Dave helped to install and operationalize the first-ever computer at the Board of Governors.
Robert K. Massie, was a Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer who wrote respected biographies of Russian royals, including “Nicholas and Alexandra,” which became a movie. He died on Monday at his home in Irvington, N.Y, at 90 years old.
He earned a bachelor’s degree in American studies at Yale and another degree in Modern History at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar before serving in the Navy.
Bill Sterling attended Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar in 1961 and studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics.
Art's formal education and multiple careers spanned seven decades. After being honorably discharged from the United States Army in 1947, he was admitted to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he earned a B.S. and M.S. in Chemical Engineering and served as class president. Subsequently, as a Rhodes Scholar, he attended Oxford University in England, earning an M.A. in Physics. Art then returned to MIT to earn a Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering. In the 1950s and 1960s he worked at Phillips Petroleum's Atomic Energy Division in Idaho, and at Westinghouse's Astronuclear Laboratory in Pittsburgh, where he developed nuclear space propulsion technologies for NASA.
In 1968 Art joined Allis-Chalmers (A-C) Corp., where he enjoyed an 18-year career in commercial engineering management, with assignments in Milwaukee, WI; London, England; and Birmingham, AL. While at A-C, he earned an M.B.A. at the University of Chicago. After retiring in 1986, he taught evening courses at Cardinal Stritch University and Marquette University. That led to his next career as Dean of Cardinal Stritch University College of Business and Management. He retired again 13 years later to follow in his wife's footsteps by enrolling at Marquette University Law School, earning a J.D. in 2005 at the age of 77 (Sheila was only 62 when she earned her J.D. in 1993). Together, they worked as defense counsel, taking assigned cases from the Wisconsin State Public Defender's Office. Art continued his law practice into his late-80s.
More impressive than Art's academic and career achievements was his passion to help others and give back to the community. He was a member of the Rotary Club of Milwaukee (RCM) and was dedicated to their mission of connecting people and resources for common good. In addition, he served on the RCM Scholarship Committee and mentored Rotary Scholars. Art, who suffered from macular degeneration, also served on the Board of Directors for Beyond Vision, a not-for-profit company with the mission of creating jobs for people with no sight or limited vision.
Outside of his professional commitments, Art was an accomplished musician who enjoyed a lifetime of making music. He loved playing the violin, clarinet, piano, and cello. In 2000, he attended the Third Annual Cello Congress in Baltimore, playing with 200 cellists from around the world. He had a beautiful tenor voice and performed eleven concerts with fellow musicians for residents of Saint John's on the Lake retirement community during the eight years he lived there.
James Patrick Griffin passed away in Oxford on 21 November 2019.
Having obtained a BA from Yale University in 1955, Jim came to Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar at Corpus Christi College (1955–58). He was then a Senior Scholar at St Antony’s College (1958–60), obtaining his doctorate in 1960. He lectured at Christ Church from 1960 to 1966, and was then appointed a Fellow in Philosophy at Keble in 1966, a position he held for 30 years. He was then appointed White’s Professor of Moral Philosophy, becoming a Fellow of Corpus Christi College. He was appointed an Honorary Fellow of Keble in 1996, and was also an Emeritus Fellow of Corpus Christi.
Husband of the late Catherine and father of Nicholas and Jessica. Beloved Grandpa of Isabel, George and Kate.
From Keble News.
Carl graduated from MIT in 1952 and was then awarded the Rhodes Scholarship, which he used to earn his PhD in Physics from Oxford University in 1956. After four years of research at the National Bureau of Standards in Washington, D.C., he took a research position in Solid State Physics at MIT. In 1967, he joined the physics faculty at Northeastern University, where he taught and continued doing research until his retirement.
Find out more about Carl's life and work.
At a picnic one spring day in 1977, John Churchill told a Yale faculty member that he had gotten a job at Hendrix College and was moving back to Arkansas, where his infant son would grow up without an accent. “The joke blew right past him, clear and clean,” Churchill later told a crowd at Hendrix.
By 1977, Churchill had been a Rhodes Scholar, earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Oxford and was finishing up his dissertation for a Ph.D. from Yale University. He spent the next 24 years at Hendrix, where he twice served as interim president, and his pickled okra won a blue ribbon at the Faulkner County Fair. Then for 15 years he was the chief executive officer of Phi Beta Kappa, the nation’s oldest academic honor society, in Washington, D.C.
Churchill, 70, died peacefully in his sleep at a hospital in Nashville, 42 miles east of his home in Dickson, where he moved after retiring in 2016. He had been battling a septic infection, according to the family.
Born April 1, 1949, John Hugh Churchill spent the first few years of his life in Hector, where his father, Olen R. Churchill, was superintendent of schools.
The family moved to Little Rock, where John Churchill took an interest in the girl next door, Jean Hill. They began dating at the age of 16, later married, had three kids and remained together the rest of his life.
Some of their fondest memories were living in a cottage in Kirtlington, about 12 miles north of Oxford, while John was studying in England.
Years later, John Churchill would occasionally torment his children with exotic dishes like pickled herring.
Churchill graduated from Little Rock’s Hall High School before attending Southwestern (now Rhodes College) at Memphis, where he was captain of the football team, conference champion at throwing the discus, and a member of Phi Beta Kappa.
For 17 of those 24 years at Hendrix, Churchill served as vice president for academic affairs and dean of the college. He had also been dean of students at Hendrix and taught philosophy throughout his time there.
Ann Die Hasselmo, who was president of Hendrix for nine years, said Churchill was “a prince of a man,” brilliant, ethical and humane.
“There aren’t many people about whom I can say this, there is nothing laudatory or flattering that you can say about John Churchill that would not be true,” Hasselmo said. “He was a remarkable, an amazing human being. Those of us who knew John and Jean mourn with the family and count ourselves fortunate to have walked a bit down the path with him.”