Cowgirl Courage: Abigail Benz ’19

Cowgirl Courage: Abigail Benz ’19

Alumni Stories, Women of Auburn, Young Alumni

Cowgirl Courage: Abigail Benz ’19

“Glitter and Dirt” is key to a Cowgirl’s mission for good

By Abigail Benz ’19

There is a podcast hosted by a dear friend, Dakota Dawn Johnson, that I was featured on called “the Cowgirl Confessions” that really changed my perspective on being a real-life cowgirl. I learned that cowgirls are anyone with grit and determination. They care about their communities and love their country. Cowgirls and cowboys are hardworking individuals who strive every day to be the best versions of themselves, but many just so happen to wear boots and a cowboy hat. And they have fun while doing it!

There isn’t a typical day in the life of a cowgirl—every day is full of challenges and opportunities. Obviously, I spend a lot of time with animals—from feeding and grooming to training to planning for sustainable growth. Animals require constant attention, and inclement weather is never an excuse!

I’m also involved in the business aspect of running the ranch and must ensure we are fiscally responsible and stick to our budget. There is never a shortage of projects around the ranch: mending fences and other structures, controlling weeds, maintaining equipment. The list never gets any shorter, but it makes every day unique.

When the weekends come, it’s rodeo time! Attending rodeos requires planning, coordination, and a lot of help from my extended rodeo family. I try to plan out my calendar at least one month ahead, contacting the rodeo producer, stock contractor, announce, and specialty act to see how I might help.

I also must coordinate with my committee, as I am under contract to represent the Limestone County Sheriff’s Rodeo and Sheriff Mike Blakely and participate in outreach. Sometimes that’s going to local schools, a media interview or participating in a parade. When the gates open, my favorite part is interacting with the rodeo fans. They are full of enthusiasm and questions.

My dad’s side of the family had a farm with cattle, swine and crops in Illinois that he would work at. He loved working with the animals and he definitely passed that love down to me.

Being a military family, we really did not have the opportunity to run our own ranch between the moves and deployments. Since I grew up mostly in suburban areas, my parents put me in horseback riding lessons, and eventually we leased land or stalls to have our horses. We recently purchased a ranch, Glitter ‘N Dirt Ranch, in Georgia (only an hour and a half from Auburn), where we are working to establish our permanent family-run operation. We currently have horses, goats, dogs, cats and one mini zebu cow.

I initially went into college as an equine science major at Colorado State University. I was on the rodeo team while I attended Colorado State University, but once I transferred to Auburn, I was not involved in any equestrian or livestock groups.

During my freshman year at Colorado State, I decided to walk away from horses and rodeo after a series of concussions. The thing about horses and rodeo is that no matter how hard you try to walk away, they never give up on you.

College gives you the opportunity to explore fields that you did not know existed and allows you to explore a variety of career paths. My eyes were opened by the College of Human Sciences and the Director of Global Education, Kate Thornton, to opportunities to make a difference. Farmers and ranchers are helping sustain future generations, and they need to be supported. I chose to major in global studies and minor in business to ignite a generation of cowgirls and cowboys, from all walks of life, who believe in supporting a sustainable western way of life worldwide.

The Global Studies in Human Sciences program at Auburn focuses on educating students on global issues, globalization, and how the world is interconnected.

One of the major global issues is hunger. I quickly learned that there is a need for innovators who are passionate about making a difference and that, even though I am only one person, I could combine my love of animals and my passion for helping others.

Miss Limestone Sheriff's Rodeo Queen Coronation

Benz when she was crowned the Miss Limestone Sheriff’s Rodeo Queen

In Nepal with Love Justice International

The trip to Kathmandu, Nepal with Love Justice International changed my life. I have always been passionate about eradicating human trafficking, and this trip opened my eyes to the need to “speak up, stand up and saddle up.” This experience formed the basis for my platform—“Cowgirl Courage”—and motivates me daily to work toward taking actions that will help eradicate modern day slavery and to assist those individuals who, through no fault of their own, have been impacted by this global tragedy.

Love Justice International trains and places monitors at borders and transit points to identify and stop trafficking as it is occurring, before beautiful lives are exploited and sold into slavery.

To date, Love Justice has intercepted over 22,000 lives to prevent them from being trafficked. Tragically, 40.3 million people live in modern-day slavery because of human trafficking. Love Justice intervenes as the crime of trafficking occurs, they can collect immensely valuable data on traffickers and their networks.

Following my Auburn study abroad, I remained in Nepal for twelve additional weeks to help eradicate labor and human trafficking throughout Southeast Asia as the anti-trafficking research and data analysis intern.

Through data analysis and investigations, Love Justice has helped authorities arrest over 900 suspected traffickers, and 31% of closed cases have resulted in convictions.

At a Border Monitoring Station in Nepal

At a border monitoring station in Nepal

As Head Wrangler at Medicine Bow Lodge

Being a head wrangler at Medicine Bow Lodge in Wyoming is a once in a lifetime opportunity that I was blessed to experience. For those who do not know what a “dude ranch” is, it is a ranch used for tourism. People from all over the world can come and spend time on these ranches and experience the western way of life firsthand.

I started going to Medicine Bow Lodge when I was eight years old. On that first visit, I wore a pink cowgirl hat and pink cowgirl boots. I remember meeting the cowboys and cowgirls who were wranglers at the time, wanting to be just like them. When I was given the opportunity to be the head wrangler, I remember in one of the first groups I took on a ride, the daughter had on pink boots. It was one of my favorite memories, because it reminded me that no dream is ever too big, and you are never too young to love Glitter N’ Dirt.

As the head wrangler, I was responsible for the management of equine operations for 25 horses and up to 20 guests at any one time. Many of these guests had never ridden horses before, so it was very important to guarantee the highest degree of safety and welfare for all of our horses and guests.

I evaluated and accommodated guests’ needs, in addition to assigning the appropriate horse and riding equipment. I guided multiple trail rides daily. Working on a ranch is not only about the horses: I prepared meals for the guests, cleaned the lodge and cabins and assisted with evening activities. Not only did I get to spend time with the animals I love the most, but I also was able to spend time with people. As an eighteen-year-old who had just graduated high school, this experience sparked my interest in business and exposing the world to the western way of life.

The 38th Miss Limestone Sheriff’s Rodeo Queen

This was my first rodeo queen pageant, and they are about so much more than looking pretty. There are speeches, horsemanship, impromptu questions, written tests and interviews. These competitions are designed to determine who is the most well-rounded cowgirl to be the ambassador for the sport.

When they called my name for winning the speech award, I was excited! It’s funny, but fear of public speaking almost delayed my graduation from Auburn; I did not want to take the required public speaking course. I finally took it—online, my last semester—so you can imagine how much this award meant to me. When they called my name as the new Miss Limestone Sheriff’s Rodeo, I could not contain my excitement. I got on the horse to run my victory lap and I almost ran over the Sheriff.

2021 Miss Rodel USA First Runner-up

I am beyond proud to be the first runner-up for Miss Rodeo USA in only my second competition. In addition to being first runner-up, I won the speech, highest written test score and fan-favorite state shirt awards.

Crowned the 38th Miss Limestone Sheriff’s Rodeo Queen in 2020

When I stood on the arena floor and heard my name called, I felt like I had accomplished my dream, despite my injuries and obstacles, and was someone that eight-year-old Abigail would be proud of.

My goal in competing for Miss Rodeo USA was to leave the pageant as a better version of myself than I was when I went in, and I more than accomplished that.

I am still Miss Limestone Sheriff’s Rodeo until May when I pass down my title at the 39th Annual Limestone County Sheriff’s Rodeo. I am working hard to plan for our pageant and rodeo, so if you are near the Athens, Ala. area, I encourage you all to come out May 14th and 15th for the “Greatest Show on Dirt East of the Mississippi.”

Rodeo queens “age out” at 26, so there is still time if I decided to compete for another title. I have enrolled in Auburn University’s Graphic Design Certificate program and I am excited to grow my skillset to help further my love of the western way of life.

I have been working to get my company “Glitter ‘N Dirt” off the ground. It’s designed to inspire everyone to have the “cowgirl state of mind.” The goal is to create a brand that sparks empowerment and a passion for the western way of life.

When we initially created our business plan, we wanted to guarantee that proceeds were going back into not only the community, but into funds that help eradicate human trafficking. Glitter ‘N Dirt helps my platform, Cowgirl Courage, provide monetary support to a multitude of organizations including, A21.

We have our first big project in the works promoting rodeo and rodeo athletes in the Southeast region in a new, innovative way and I cannot wait for everyone to see the final outcome this spring. I am also working to train a new horse named Tinkerbell. She is a seven-month-old perlino American Quarter Horse. She is full of spunk, sass and of course, Glitter ‘N Dirt.

 

At Miss Rodeo USA

More Alumni Stories

To the Moon and Beyond: Chuck Bergh ’94

To the Moon and Beyond: Chuck Bergh ’94

Alumni Stories

To the Moon and Beyond: Chuck Bergh ’94

How are we going to explore distant planets? With robots, of course

By Derek Herscovici ’14

Chuck Bergh and the robot

RoboSimian (Cylde) with Brett Kennedy (left) and Chuck Bergh. RoboSimian, developed to respond to mass industrial accidents such as the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant meltdown in 2011, placed 5th worldwide in the DARPA Robotics Challenge. December 2013. Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory engineer Chuck Bergh ’94 has been passionate about all things aerospace ever since he was a child. Both of his grandfathers served in the military and his father was in the Air Force, so he grew up around stories of fighter planes and all of the military’s cutting-edge technology.

But by the time Bergh was ready for college, his dream of pursuing a career in aerospace seemed as dim as Saturn’s rings. When he got to Auburn University, he switched his major from aerospace to mechanical engineering and set his sights on a career in manufacturing, securing a job with electronics giant TDK Corporation after graduation.

“We’d seen the beginnings of the ‘peace dividend’ start to kick in because we had already ended hostilities with the Russians at that point,” Bergh says, “and America just wasn’t spending as much on its defense program at the time.”

Nearly three decades later, though, Bergh is the lead test and integration engineer for the Vision Compute Element of the Mars 2020 mission, named Perseverance and launched this past summer, which will seek signs of ancient life and collect rock and soil samples for possible return to Earth.

“The Vision Compute Element is a computer we built to improve landing accuracy,” Bergh says. “For example, the landing sites for the previous Spirit and Opportunity rovers were roughly 100 kilometers by 10 kilometers, or about the size of a county. For Perseverance, we have tightened that to a 40 meter diameter circle, or about half a football field.”

Bergh got the opportunity to reclaim his childhood dream of working for NASA while he pursuing his doctorate in engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology in the late 1990s. As luck would have it, he happened to get an interview with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where they essentially offered to pay him to do the work he was about to do for free during his Georgia Tech doctorate.

“I grew up watching the Apollo program, the Space Shuttle program, and all these really cool things happening,” Bergh says, “and suddenly I’m being invited to join that club. So I jumped on the opportunity to come out to Pasadena.”

Bergh started his career with NASA in robotics, and that’s where he’s been ever since — including work on RoboSimian, an ape-like robot that competed in the DARPA Robotics Challenge finals in 2015. An engineer with a master’s degree among a team of PhDs, Bergh is affectionately called “Howard Wolowitz,” the character from The Big Bang Theory, by his wife Tanja. Now, with the Mars 2020 mission, Bergh has been able to transfer his engineering expertise from a walking robot to a driving rover.

“When I came to JPL, I started working on these portable robots, which later became PackBot from iRobot and picked up by the military,” Bergh says. “This is what they were sending into the caves to protect our soldiers trying to clear caves and in Iraq and Afghanistan. At the same time, I was also working on new ways to land on comets, and those techniques have evolved into what we’re using for Mars now.”

What’s unique about Mars 2020 is that Bergh and his team have come up with the first purpose-built instrument that will change personalities during a mission. When Perseverance lands, the team will load new software into the Vision Compute Element that will transform it from a landing computer to a driving computer.

“What most people don’t know,” Bergh says, “is that all the previous rovers would drive for a little bit, stop, look around, assess their surroundings, choose a new path, and then move forward again. The whole purpose of this new computer is to allow the rover to drive on the surface continuously.”

Bergh’s plan for the foreseeable future is to keep answering the calls of what the NASA scientists come up with next, including working to provide terrain-relative navigation for the Human Landing System for the Artemis program, which intends to land the first woman and the next man on the moon by 2024.

But one of the areas he’s particularly interested in is a mission to the ocean moons orbiting Saturn and Jupiter.

“We’re working on some cool technologies to explore these water vents and cryo volcanoes that exist on these other moons,” Bergh says. “We’re developing a snake robot that could potentially crawl its way down into them and investigate.”

Though Bergh has seen many changes in manufacturing technologies since he got that serendipitous interview with JPL twenty years ago — innovations like additive manufacturing and 3D printing that allow NASA engineers to make better motors and structures for going to these far-off places — neither his curiosity nor his passion has been satisfied.

“I still think about my grandfather a lot,” Bergh says. “He grew up in central Alabama at the turn of the century, and yet he saw so much in his lifetime: the Battle of the Bulge, the entire Apollo and Space Shuttle programs.”

“I’m hoping that I can see nearly half as much change in my lifetime as he saw.”

More Alumni Stories

Two of a Kind

Two of a Kind

Alumni Stories, Auburn Magazine, Diversity Alumni Spotlight

Two of a Kind

How two friends in two different fields came together to make a big difference

By Derek Herscovici ’14

Phillips and Jones serving meals to a school

She’s Chelsea Phillips ’15, the head of her own boutique public relations firm. He’s Jonathan Jones ’15, cornerback for the New England Patriots and a two-time Super Bowl champion. Their friendship began at Auburn, but now it’s connecting their professional careers like never before. Auburn Magazine sat down with the longtime friends to see what brought them together and how their careers continue to grow.

Auburn Magazine: How did you two first meet? Did you know each other before?

Chelsea Phillips: We met at Auburn and became really close friends…was that our junior year? We both had a class in Lowder and when we had some little break time, we would go in there and get some coffee and just talk about life. We’re both from Georgia, but prior to Auburn we didn’t know each other.

Jonathan Jones: It was definitely outside between classes and just having conversations at the Starbucks at Lowder about the future. Kind of what we wanted out of life. My plans of wanting to be in the NFL. Her plans wanting to work in PR. Just conversations like that over and over.

AM: What is the motivation behind the Jonathan Jones Next Step Foundation?

JJ: It’s focused around youth, just the next step in life. I feel like everyone gets to a point where they need direction and mentorship. They need someone to help them move to the next step. A lot of people have goals and ambitions—they just need help getting on that next path and that next step.

“Not everyone is going to score touchdowns on Sunday, but they can score touchdowns in life. Being good parents, being good citizens, things like that are what my foundation is based on.”

AM: When did you start working together professionally?

JJ: For me, my head was spinning. My first couple of years, I was undrafted. Football was my main focus. Last year, I finally got to that place in my career where I had a break and was kind of like, “what is Jonathan Jones beyond football?” I wanted to start my own foundation and go on that path. My first contact I reached out to was Chelsea. I was like “hey, these are some ideas. I’ve got a lot going on in my head and I need someone to facilitate that because football just takes up this large portion of my life.” There’s so much more that I still want to do, that we are doing. It just started from that.

CP: Jon had been playing in New England for I think two or three years at that point, and I would just call and check in. He was, like, “Sis, you haven’t even come to a game,” so I went to Boston…we didn’t really even have the conversation then, but in February 2019 we talked about it. Jon reached out. He said “I’m thinking about having a football camp this year; I want you to plan it.” And I was, like, OK. All those Auburn conversations had manifested, and here we are.

AM: Chelsea, that’s similar to your “Beyond the Jersey” project, right? 

CP: My whole goal with that series is to highlight what the athletes are doing outside the field. It’ll probably launch the first part of 2021. It was kind of inspired by the comment made toward LeBron James, “shut up and dribble.” We see a lot of that nowadays—people want athletes to be quiet, they don’t want them to have an opinion, and they just want them to shut up and play.

There are so many amazing people doing so many amazing things, but a lot of times, the only things people are focused on is what they do on Sunday, or Monday or Thursday. I think it’s a cool way to highlight what they’re doing outside of football.

AM: What makes your friendship translate to work so successfully?

JJ: When you think of PR, you want someone who knows you on a personal level. Who understands your personal vision. When I tell Chelsea I want to do this, she sees it the way I would like to see it. Having someone who’s familiar with me and knows how I see things, how I want things to be done, that’s the first part of your relationship: knowing your client.

CP: It’s cool to know him on that personal level and not just strictly business. Every time we talk, it’s not just “hey Jonathan, what do we need to do?” Our foundation is “hey, how’s [your daughter] Skylar doing? How’s your mom doing?” It’s cool to have that friendship component of the business as well.

What was it like starting the Super Bowl, preparing and winning?

JJ: That was crazy. The week before, I played primarily corner in the AFC Championship game. Then the coaches came to me about a week before the Super Bowl and were like ‘hey, how do you feel like playing safety?’ I’m like, ‘I’ve never done it before, but if it’ll help us win, I’m down to do it.’

Just to be out there contributing, competing, coming back [after] missing the Super Bowl before with an injury…it’s not like you’re going to go the Super Bowl every year, so just having that opportunity to be right back after watching my teammates go out and compete but come up short. That year, having the opportunity to affect it and be out there, it meant so much to me.

AM: Do you have any favorite memories of working together?

CP: My favorite memory is our first event—I don’t know if Jonathan even knows this—but I was so nervous. I wanted everything to go off without a hitch. We had a football camp and his agent was there and he said, “I’ve never seen a camp perform this well.” He’s been an agent now for 20-plus years and he’s, like, “this went off without a hitch. It seemed like a five-year camp to me.” And that was really rewarding to hear him say that.

Chelsea Phillips holding a football
“Not everyone is going to score touchdowns on Sunday, but they can score touchdowns in life. Being good parents, being good citizens, things like that are what my foundation is based on.”

How do you go from being undrafted to playing in the NFL?

JJ: That was my whole focus, making sure I had a job, just trying to prove my worth. Coming in undrafted, day in and day out, just proving yourself, continuing to earn your job. Not saying it’s not that way as much [once] you become a veteran, but you’ve kind of solidified yourself in certain ways—people already know what you can do in this league. [It’s] hard, though, going undrafted; you don’t have any guarantees, so you’re just working from the bottom.

Your team has won two Super bowls and been to three, that’s got to be pretty sweet

JJ: That’s life changing [laughs]. You come in your rookie year, go to the Super Bowl versus your hometown team, that’s amazing. You win that, come back the second year, go to the Super Bowl…I got hurt in the playoffs, that was a tough one to sit out. Then that third year, coming back, starting, being a pivotal person on the defense and the team, getting that start and winning the super bowl again, it’s been a crazy journey. You take it step by step and day by day.

AM: What projects are you working on next?

JJ: Right now, we have social justice reform that we’re doing with the team, so I put my attention toward that. We felt that as the “patriots” of New England, we had an extreme platform, and just being able to use that for so many things outside of football kind of just goes back to that “Beyond the Jersey” topic—we step off the football field and we still have the same impact that we have on Sundays.

What’s it like living and training in the middle of the Pandemic?

JJ: It’s been different. I’ve had some experience knowing what an offseason should look like, trying to stay on that same schedule and routine, but it’s been different.

When it first started, once everything shut down, I was trying to assemble a home gym to keep the workouts going. That was frantic, weights were sold out everywhere. People were trying to find something to do and stay safe and stay healthy, but at the same time knowing the season was hopefully going to take place, so still training as though things were going to be the same.

Once we got to camp, everything became normal a little bit. You’re back with the teammates, you’re back with the training [schedule]. We didn’t have a preseason, which was different, kind of hurt a lot of the younger guys, but the older guys definitely knew what to expect.

Chelsea Phillips holding a football

Chelsea, how has your public relations work been affected by the Pandemic?

CP: I actually balance two careers, I’m in insurance as well. That’s been very busy—a lot of people are now seeing the importance of having life insurance.

As far as the sports PR side goes, it’s kind of just thinking of ways to get creative to keep Jonathan’s name at the forefront, because of course we want to make sure he gets the recognition [he deserves] off the field. That was always my goal when it came to working with professional athletes—they’re so much bigger than the person they are on the field, they have personalities outside [the game] as well, so just thinking of creative ways to make sure we’re keeping him relevant, for lack of a better word, off the football field.

Jonathan, what is it like playing with new quarterback Cam Newton?

JJ: It’s definitely different than Tom Brady. He brings a little piece of the south back up north and it’s definitely, uh, a little bit refreshing [laughs].

Having someone back from home, obviously another Georgia native and Auburn alum, he brings great energy, he’s been a great leader, just earning the trust of the locker room every day. Having a former MVP and someone who knows the league in and out, just to be here to lead this team, he’s done such a good job so far and I wish him nothing but continued success.

It’s completely different — different offense, different team without Tom, but one thing about the coaching staff, [OC Josh McDaniels] will find a way to get the most out of his players and having Cam, with his skillset and abilities, those guys are going to do phenomenal things on offense.

Chelsea, what’s it like working in Public Relations and achieving the first stage of your dream?

CP: It’s definitely exactly what I thought it would be. As far as representing clients, taking what I Iearned in class, writing a press releases when it’s time to get the media out to events. I’m glad I’m able to use my degree—I joke with my parents that in my first 3.5 years of working in the family insurance business, I kind of didn’t need to go to college, so it’s cool to use the things I learned in college and to apply them here.

It’s cool because people have reached out to me, younger girls who find me off social media, find me off hashtags, ‘oh my gosh you’re in sports PR, that’s always what I wanted to do…’— I just to talk to them about the importance of networking.  I always say it didn’t just fall in my lap, I used to tell Jonathan this is what I wanted to do, I put it on social media, “this is what I want to do” this is my desire, so just teaching and coaching younger women [about] what it’s like, what to look for, whatever their end-goal is.

How do you make time for working together during the regular season?

 CP: Tuesdays are typically Jonathan’s off days, and I know he said he wanted to give back to the community up in Boston, so I was like ‘OK, just explain what it is you want to do.’ My role, my responsibility, is to find the organization, make contact, make media contacts, things of that nature, and just kind of plan it out.

Jonathan is obviously the brain [and] the financial piece behind it, but I plan through logistics and set everything up and say ‘hey, OK we have this at this time on this day’ and we make it roll from there. We play well off each other’s schedules in my opinion.

JJ: People like Chelsea are extremely important for me because, we have a million things going through our heads each week. A lot of things are important, but Coach [Belichick] always says ‘it’s not about the game on Sunday.” You’re battling that mindset with work because you have to be present, you have to have your emotions, your mental and your physical locked in to have success on the football field.

But at the same time, I have so many ideas and things I want to do in my head. Having someone that I can have a conversation with and say ‘hey, this is just what I’m thinking, I don’t know how it’s possible or how we can get it done, but this is what I’m thinking, can you help me get this done?’ That is extremely important because having someone bring those thoughts together takes some weight off my shoulders.

back of Jones jersey in the stadium

More Alumni Stories

Auburn Faculty Hobbies

Auburn Faculty Hobbies

Auburn Magazine, Faculty

Auburn Faculty Hobbies

From painting orcs to racing dirt bikes, Auburn professors have hobbies as varied as their areas of expertise

By Jeremy Henderson ’04
It’s nothing fancy. Nothing too involved. It’s not like she has an elaborate dedicated studio. When Lindsay Tan needs to, she throws some newspaper down on the kitchen table and breaks out the Minotaur Maroon and Fairy Fuchsia, grabs the brushes and unwinds. That thing she does? It’s just a pastime.

Peter Stanwick, on the other hand? Pastime doesn’t do it justice. Heck, after 54 years, calling his colossal collection a passion probably doesn’t even cover it. (His wife might go with “plague.”)

Kevin Smith’s students don’t even know about his weekend double life. Maybe they have noticed some extra muscle tone lately, but he’s mostly managed to keep his recent adrenaline addiction under wraps.

But practically the entire neighborhood knows what David Timm’s up to out there on clear nights.

Here’s a look at four Auburn professors who, as it turns out, are people with pastimes and passions like the rest of us. Pastimes and passions pursued entirely outside the classroom. Pastimes and passions that, given their day jobs and expertise, might come as a surprise.

Older man holding a record in a dark lit record storage room
Peter Stanwick
In 1969, an 8-year-old Peter Stanwick went to a store in his hometown of Toronto and bought his first vinyl record: the Beatles White Album. That was 12,000 records ago, give or take a few hundred. But mostly give. Because Peter Stanwick can’t stop buying them. Or spinning them.

In March, Stanwick, a professor in the Raymond J. Harbert College of Business since 1993, celebrated the 20th anniversary of his Auburn campus radio show on WEGL, “’80s Rewind.” The kids these days download the songs they want to play and then upload them into a digital audio library. Not Stanwick. He puts his back into it. He still lugs his weekly playlist in the doors in crates. Could anyone tell if he just popped in a thumb drive? Maybe. Maybe not. But Peter could. It is, he says, the principle of the thing.

Google around about the recent resurgence in vinyl records, and you’ll see audiophiles pretending that music sounds better on vinyl, sure. But most folks just credit it to something they call the connection. Maybe it’s the work that goes into it—the best practices of careful storage, of avoiding scratches, the magical sonic surgery of pulling songs from polyvinyl chloride with a needle. Maybe it’s the sense that watching a record spin is kind of like its own little performance. But vinyl, so the theory goes—and so Stanwick swears—allows music lovers to–somehow, some way–feel connected to the music they love more than any other medium.

Yes, he pays for a streaming music subscription. But only the family uses it, not him. It’s just not his style. Spotify doesn’t give you liner notes, it doesn’t show you what’s on the back cover, or what color the vinyl is. For Stanwick, music isn’t something to enjoy just with your ears. You do it with your ears and your eyes and your hands and your mind. And your wallet. And your basement.

“We made custom shelving for the records, for the music room. But we’re almost at full capacity with those shelves,” Stanwick said. “I don’t really know what Plan B is. I also have 5,000 CDs.”

Middle age man looking through a telescope at night
DAVID TIMM
For a guy who’s made a career of studying stuff on the ground, David Timm sure does look up a lot. So up that the neighbors ask questions. The most common is the obvious: “What are you looking at?” Timm will tell them and offer them a look and they’ll ooh and ahh, and then the next time they drive by and see the pavements and materials professor out at night with one or more of his four telescopes, Timm says some of the nicer ones will even help him out.

“They’ll dim their headlights for me to help maintain the dark sky.”

And dark skies are important for astrophotography. Which is exactly what it sounds like. And thanks to the astronomical advances in technology over the last decade or so, this type of dark-sky photography has become very popular.

Timm’s been at it for a decade and he and his scopes and digital cameras are slowly working their way through the Messier Catalog, a 250-year-old list of 110 cosmos Kodak moments. At last count, Timm has logged 70, some multiple times, like the Orion Nebula, his favorite.

Producing stunning images of the night sky and all its nearby nebulae has never been easier. Still, if you’re serious about it, it’s not exactly the simplest hobby. First you must align the telescopes and camera mounts to the celestial pole to counter the earth’s rotation. Then, collect the raw images—the deep sky objects sometimes in exposures as long as five minutes, the solar system stuff sometimes at 80 frames per second—and then stack and process the heck out of them with various astro-friendly apps. It all takes a lot of time. But he does it as often as life and work and clear skies will allow. The finished product? Always worth it.

“There’s just so much beauty to be found out there,” Timm said. “Most of which is invisible to us without a telescope.”

Middle age woman holding out her hands displaying miniature figurines
LINDSAY TAN
Maybe it was because her dad was into model trains when she was growing up. Maybe it was just something to do to pass the pandemic. Maybe it just caught her eye on Pinterest one day. Interior design professor and program coordinator Lindsay Tan can’t really pinpoint why exactly she got into it, or where she even got the idea. She just knows it works. Painting miniature, custom-designed, 3D-printed Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) figurines at her kitchen table does exactly what a hobby is supposed to do: take your mind off things.

“My job is really intellectually challenging, and I find myself constantly thinking about the problems I’m working on,” she said. “But this—this is something with straightforward parameters. I can just immerse myself mentally with this one thing.”

And, yes, it is a thing. “Miniature painting”—that’s how the bloggers who write about it and the companies who produce branded paints for it refer to the activity. Be it by simple base coating and highlighting, or more advanced stuff like layering, blending and wet blending, Tan uses tiny brushes with “Silver Dragon” or “Merfolk Turquoise” or “Fire Newt Orange” paint colors and paints tiny orcs, dwarves and dragons. Or whatever other fantasy archetypes populate tabletop roleplaying lore. The painting has practically become a pursuit in itself, separate from the games, which Tan has only now gotten into because of the painting.

“D&D was always on the periphery of my life, and a lot of my friends play,” Tan said. “I had done a few one-off (games) without getting too heavily into it. But then I was reminded that this figure painting component existed. I was invited to a group and joined a campaign, but I wasn’t cool enough to play D&D growing up.”

But she’s determined her kids will be. “I’m creating a campaign for them to do this summer.”

Which means it’s probably time to order more elven armor.

Middle age man sitting on dirt bike in a green field on a sunny day
KEVIN SMITH
You’ve probably caught it on ESPN when they’re showing X-Games kind of stuff. People striving against all odds to race dirt bikes through the woods, up and down rugged inclines, over open terrain and rocks, through mud, through pain, through everything, in a set time limit. Sometimes it’s several hours. Sometimes it’s multiple days. It requires strength, strategy, smarts and stamina. And its name is enduro racing. And, Kevin Smith, mild-mannered media studies professor, is pretty darn good at it.

Second place is good right? That’s what he got in the Southern Off-Road Championship Series. There were around 20 entrants in his division and he and the Wombat—that’s what he and his wife call his bike just because it sounds cool—beat out 18 of them.

He started riding never intending to race. He’d gotten a motorcycle for his campus commute a few years back, and he’d done some dirt biking with friends out in Colorado. Then one day he decided to combine the experience. He pulled the trigger on a dirt bike and found some folks to ride with.

“I was kind of looking for something more,” he said. He wasn’t alone. And from a Church of the Highlands small group of thrill seekers sprang a local community of riders who joyfully spend their weekends straining muscles they didn’t know they had on a five-mile trail on a member’s nearby piece of property. Or, nowadays, at an officially sanctioned race.

Smith has done a few races. He has also once placed third. But we won’t talk much about what happened in February in muddy Mississippi.

“It rained seven inches the night before and there was this giant, muddy rut that just ate my bike,” Smith said. “The mud was so thick that the back end was straight up. That was a first.”

He was stranded for a little while, he says. But at least he wasn’t bored.

More Alumni Stories

Auburn Rugby Club’s Rise to Greatness

Auburn Rugby Club’s Rise to Greatness

Alumni Stories, Armed Forces, Athletics, Auburn History, Auburn Magazine, Students

Auburn Rugby Club’s Rise to Greatness

For decades, Auburn’s Rugby Club fought for relevance as much as victory. Then they were national champions.

By Derek Herscovici ’14

Rugby team cheering in their jerseys

“For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother” William Shakespeare, “Henry V”

They lined up 15 men to a side, each tense with concentration. Over the next 80 minutes the two teams’ fates would be determined through bone-rattling hits, tactical precision and an all-out team effort in the pursuit of victory. And it would all be played without pads.

Auburn University versus Montana State for the 2021 Division II College Rugby Championship.

Self-coached, self-recruited, self-funded—the story of the Auburn Rugby Club’s rise to national prominence is burnished with hard work, personal touch and perseverance—hallmarks of the Auburn Creed. Perennial underdogs, the Tigers would cap their season with the most improbable moment in the program’s more than 50-year history—a national title.

The quest for perfection began in 2020. Nick Prather, a third-year veterinary grad student, took over as the team’s head coach after playing as a student at the University of Kentucky. Before Auburn he spent time on a New Zealand rugby club, and he volunteered as head coach out of love for the game.

“I know somebody in just about every country because of rugby,” said Prather. “Because of rugby you might have a job offer, a place to stay. You have friends no matter where you go.”

He found a kindred spirit in Sam Parks, vice president of human resources for Global K9 Protection Group. Parks discovered rugby as a youth, and it guided him virtually everywhere he went, from attending college at Oxford to playing for clubs in Ireland. After he and his family moved to Auburn, it felt natural to contact the local club and lend a hand.

“I was welcomed by a group of criminals, doctors, lawyers, you name it,” said Parks, the team’s assistant coach. “People understand and respect the commitment and sacrifice it takes, so when you meet other [rugby] people, there’s a real camaraderie.”

Bonded by the sport, Prather and Parks embarked on a recruiting tour to build a team of student-athletes familiar with the game. Auburn’s national recognition proved an easy sell for out-of-state students. With little more than a plan—and a promise—they recruited five players from around the country to the Plains.

“Everything was equal between Auburn and a bunch of other Power Five schools, except the rugby program,” said Prather. “The only reason the students came to Auburn, all five, was to come play rugby here. We looked at their parents and said, ‘We will help your kids not only become better rugby players, but better people.’”

“From underdogs to champions, the Tigers had finally earned the respect of teams and sportswriters around the country.”

The new arrivals kickstarted a development cycle that achieved in one season what Prather said it took his coach at Kentucky a decade to do. The new recruits and veterans—some also military veterans—coached one another and sharpened their skills for a sport that requires as much technique as toughness to succeed.

Among the new recruits was Danny Helton, a junior from Nashville who fell in love with rugby in high school and served as captain during the 2021 season.

“We had a lot of new guys come out who were great athletes, but they’d never touched a rugby ball, and within a season, they were already high-performing players,” said Helton. “We’re seeing the new guys turn into the veterans, and they’re passing on knowledge to the new guys. You get a lot of individual skills and knowledge from the players above you, then the coaches come together and lead the team in the right direction.”

Easily one of the most unique coaching dynamics in Auburn’s history, Prather and Parks couldn’t be more different. Parks is “old school”: soft-spoken, focused on player development and conditioning. Prather, a student of the modern game and a keen tactician, is a sometimes volcanic presence on the sidelines, bellowing commands from one side of the pitch to the other.

Rugby team photo in their jerseys

The 2022-2023 Auburn University Rugby Club. The coaches, in blue, are (L-R) Sam Parks, Nick Prather and Niko Spino ’23.

They were joined by player-coach Niko Spino ’23, a former grad student and U.S. Army veteran who by season’s end was voted D2 Player of the Year. Their combined experience was crucial.

For years Auburn had consistently ranked at or near the bottom of the Southern College Rugby Conference (SCRC), the Division II (DII) conference for schools in the SEC and around the South. Since the team was unable to practice or play for the majority of 2020 due to COVID, expectations were already low.

Compounding the issue was the team’s status as a club sport, making it ineligible for funding from the Auburn Athletics Department that would go toward recruiting players, buying new equipment and paying for team travel to away games.

In years past, club teams like Auburn played in small-college or DII divisions against teams with similar financial situations. But larger schools with fully funded varsity or even “pseudo-varsity” teams have recently been entering into lower divisions to develop their program and dominate their schedule. In 2021, the year Auburn won the DII national championship, they were the only nonvarsity team to reach the Final Four.

All this is to say that the odds were against them. Yet day after day, through a nine-game season, the team grew stronger until the Tigers at last reached their goal of a postseason berth.

Their playoff entry meant a rematch with Georgia Tech, who tied Auburn on a technicality in the first game of the season. The Tigers would not be denied twice, winning 24-22 in gutsy fashion.

Next, against national powerhouse Memphis in the SCRC title game, Coach Prather identified a strategic weakness that sprung the Auburn counterattack and suffocated the opponent. The final score, 25-15, suggests a game closer than it was.

On Dec. 4, 2021, at the College Rugby Fall Classic in Charlotte, N.C., Auburn defeated Montana State 31-12 for the American College Rugby/SCRC Men’s DII Championship. At long last the Tigers were on top.

“That Montana State game in the championship was one of the hardest-hitting games I’ve ever seen, and I’ve played for 30 years all over the world,” said Parks.

The Tigers flew home with the trophy in hand, while their 23-year-old head coach flew home with alumni on a private jet—a surreal ending for such an unremarkable beginning.

“I had never coached a team at anything, and I had been out of the game for about year with my first year of vet school and COVID,” said Prather. “But I am luckier in a sense that no team I’ve ever been a part of had been so coachable and loved each other like this one.”

The national conversation on Auburn changed with their victory that day. From underdogs to champions, the Tigers finally had earned the respect of teams and sportswriters around the country.

“In the end, Auburn, a program that has not been prominent on the national stage for a long time, showed they can not only win their conference, but win across conference boundaries as well,” wrote the Goff Rugby Report of the championship. “And for Newman [Garrett Newman ’22], who just took up the game recently, it was an MVP day.”

If rugby was played at Auburn before the advent of American football in 1892, we have no record. But a 1968 exhibition match on the Plains, between Huntsville’s Redstone Rugby Football Club and the Pensacola Rugby Club, spurred enough interest for Auburn to field its first team on Oct. 16, 1969.

Wayne Wolfe, who joined the team in 1971 as a student, vividly recalls the haphazard conditions of the field the early teams played on.

“We played games usually on Sunday, sometimes following an Auburn football game,” said Wolfe. “Our ‘pitch’ was on the west side of Jordan-Hare Stadium, which was used to park cars and tailgate. They would somewhat clean the pitch before a match, but we would find ourselves rolling in chicken bones and broken bottles!”

Wolfe and teammate Howard Porter met with Athletic Director Lee Hayley, who promised to help find a new field and invited the team to play a demonstration match during halftime of the spring 1973 football game as a gesture of support. Eventually the field at the intersection of West Thatch Avenue and Hemlock Drive, across from the Farmhouse and Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity houses, became the AURC’s home for the next 40-plus years.

The sport surged in popularity during the 1970s. Even Auburn President Harry M. Philpott’s son, Cabell Philpott ’75, played on the team, and the president could often be seen watching from the sidelines.

At the time, Auburn played year-round in the Georgia Rugby Union (GRU), often against older, more experienced teams.

Rugby player diving for the ball while other players surround him attempting to tackle him

A player on the 1973 Auburn Rugby Club goes all in to complete the play.

“In the old days, teams in the South would play anyone, club or college,” said Tim Curry ’73. “Club teams were mostly made up of members that were over 21 and had an [experience] advantage. The games were more physical—the push sometimes would go back and forth for minutes before the ball would come out.”

Despite the physicality of the sport in the 1970s and ’80s, Auburn won its GRU division in the 1982-83 season—its first such championship of any kind.

“It used to be called ‘Cowboy Rugby’ when I played, and things have improved dramatically since that time,” recalled Mark O’Neill ’88. “Auburn Rugby at our peak in the early ’80s was based on a fast, physical pack and the occasional aligning of the gods that gave us some backs that would tackle, and one who could kick—Mark Kribel ’85. One season—1981?—we beat Alabama like 11 times.”

Auburn built its reputation as the 1980s progressed, but off the field, a different kind of challenge was far from over—the scrum for funding. To compete, the players had to find ways to finance their own team.

The Rugger Huggers, the team’s “little sister” group, supported the club through bake sales and T-shirts. In other instances, personal donations from players and alumni were required. Once, in 1982, the AURC auctioned off a 1975 Buick LeSabre to raise money for the team. One-dollar chances were sold outside Haley Center, with the winner announced before the game against the Fort Benning Flyers.

Circumstances were already dire when a bizarre coincidence—a rumor that hazardous chemicals had been dumped at the site of the future rugby pitch back in the 1950s—prompted an EPA investigation. No evidence was found, but, unable to practice or play home games, the AURC went on hiatus from 1987-1990.

Upon its return, the AURC was once again met with widespread support across campus. A women’s rugby club was established in 1992. Hardly a decade later, in 1999, now playing in the SCRC, Auburn won the DII conference championship, becoming the first Southeastern team to win a game at the national level. In 2013 they did it again.

“Winning the SCRC Championship in 2013 is one of my favorite memories—we rolled Toomer’s Corner when we got back in town,” recalled Morgan Bevins ’16. “Also the ‘Prom Dress Rugby’ with the women’s team. My wife [Karen Dillon ’16] played on the women’s team, and we met each other on the sidelines. My old Auburn teammate—and current Birmingham Vulcan teammate, Tyler Taunton ’15—was the officiant at our wedding.”

“It used to be called ‘Cowboy Rugby’…” Mark O’Neill ’88

With their rough-and-tumble past seemingly behind them, the future is bright for the Auburn University Rugby Club.

Though their defense of the national title came up short, 2022 was another hard-fought season that further established the Auburn brand of rugby. Coaches Prather and Parks have already recruited 10 incoming student-players to the team—some away from previous commitments—and are poised to replenish a deep roster with even more experience.

Contributions from alumni like Howard Porter ’73, who’s established scholarships and matched funding, have gone a long way toward strengthening the foundation he helped lay as a player decades before.

“This current team is an incredible bunch of young men—outstanding character, incredible athletes and destined for greatness in a variety of fields,” said Porter. “You’ll never know how great the game is until you lace up the shoes and get out there.”

Long gone are the days of scrumming in chicken bones and beer cans. The Tigers’ new home, located inside a brand-new $22 million-dollar Sportsplex completed in 2020, has five multipurpose turf fields for clubs, intramurals and student recreation. It was funded entirely through student fees.

For Coach Prather, whose time in veterinary school—and at Auburn—is coming to a close, the team’s elevation to contender is one he can still savor, no matter how bittersweet. And yet, he gives Auburn the credit.

“Auburn sells itself,” said Prather. “To see alumni and friends who don’t know a single kid on the team wearing Auburn rugby gear in the cold, cheering us on as we win our first playoff game since 1999—it just shows the sustainability this program can have if given the right opportunities.”

More Alumni Stories

We’ll Meet Again

We’ll Meet Again

Alumni Stories, Armed Forces, Auburn Magazine

We’ll Meet Again

Thanks to some passionate supporters, a powerful Holocaust play with Auburn ties will extend its run through September

By Kate Asbury Larkin ’21

Last year when Auburn Men’s Basketball Coach Bruce Pearl accepted an invitation to attend a musical in Opelika, Ala., he and his wife, Brandy, knew little about what they were going to see. All they had heard about the world premiere of “We’ll Meet Again” was that it was about patriotism and the Holocaust, two things that mean a great deal to the couple.

“We went kind of on a whim,” Pearl said. “But that night we were treated to something we really weren’t expecting. We laughed and we cried. We enjoyed the music and the dancing. We were filled with great pride and happiness about the greatest country in the world that we love so dearly.”

The Pearls were so impressed with the show that they met with the playwright and director afterward to offer encouragement and support to see if the show could continue after that night.

“Brandy and I were deeply affected by this production,” Pearl said. “We think it is so important for other people to see it that we have partnered with the show to organize a tour.”

“We’ll Meet Again” is an upbeat, yet powerful musical set in World War II. It tells the life story of Henry Stern who, at just five years old, along with his parents and older sister, escaped Nazi Germany to move to Opelika where he lived the rest of his life.

The show was developed in part by the world-famous Barter Theatre in Abingdon, Va. after receiving high praise at the Appalachian Festival of Plays & Playwrights in 2019. After COVID halted the full production in 2020, the show finally premiered at the Historic Savannah Theatre in Savannah, Ga. for two weeks before the one-night performance at the Opelika Center for the Performing Arts.

With the Pearls leading the way, and the same cast and crew from the original performances on board, “We’ll Meet Again” will travel to towns across the Southeast during the month of September.

“We want as many middle and high school students as possible to see the performance during the day, and as many families and adults as possible to attend in the evenings,” Pearl said. “Our young people today are not being taught enough about how good this country is; this production will make them proud to be an American. The 1940s music and dancing, as well as the story, will inspire them—and anybody who sees the show.”

Tricia Skelton ’95 and Kate Gholston, teachers at Opelika Middle School, developed a Holocaust-related curriculum years ago that is taught to students in the Opelika City Schools system. They have put their lessons and activities together in an easy-to-follow format to be used by teachers in the secondary schools in the cities where the show will be performed.

“There are universal lessons in this production,” said Farrell Seymore ’97, superintendent of Opelika City Schools. “It’s a message of hope. It’s humorous. It’s funny, but it’s also very meaningful and touching. I think every student throughout the Southeast—throughout America—can learn lessons from the Stern family and from the community that received them. This is a universal story that should be heard.”

Heinz Julius Stern was born to Arnold and Hedwig Stern on Sept. 4, 1931. The Sterns lived in Westheim, Westfalen, Germany—the only Jewish family in a small town. Heinz’s great-uncle, Julius Hagedorn, a highly respected owner of a department store in Opelika, and his wife, Amelia, visited the Sterns in 1936 and tried desperately to persuade them to go to America.

A year later, after selling all their belongings, the Sterns were finally ready to go. Before leaving, family members gathered at the family farm to say goodbye and to take one last photo.  From there, the four Sterns traveled to Hamburg, Germany and, along with 330 other passengers, boarded the S.S. Washington, the last ship of Jews to legally leave the country. During their trip to the United States, the children “adopted” American names and Heinz became Henry.

The family settled in in Opelika. Stern (and his sister, Lora) attended Opelika schools. He played football and basketball in high school and graduated from Clift High School (Opelika High School) in 1950. Following graduation, he served in the U.S. Navy from 1951 to 1954 and later enrolled in Alabama Polytechnic University (now Auburn University), where he walked on the basketball team and studied business administration. Stern was a partner in a department store in downtown before being named president of the Opelika Chamber of Commerce, where he spent the rest of his career.

During all his years in America, neither Stern nor any other family members knew the whereabouts of relatives left behind in Germany. After the war, a college friend of Stern’s went to Germany to teach and took the Stern name with him to see what he could find. The news was devastating. Stern’s maternal grandmother, paternal grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins had all been deported to concentration camps and were murdered by the Nazis. The surviving family members were sent to ghettos and spent the remainder of their lives picking up the shattered pieces.

All his adult life—for more than 50 years—Stern desperately searched for someone from his family who had survived and was still alive. Then, in the wee hours of Nov. 21, 2004, Stern got a break. A friend emailed a link to a website that tracks Holocaust victims and their families. After literally thousands of failures over the years, Stern, who never gave up hope, typed in his grandmother’s name and for the first time something came up: a Fred Hertz in Durham, N.C.

Stern waited until daylight and called the stranger. He introduced himself and told Hertz he had spent years searching for surviving family. He asked if he could email a family photograph taken in 1937, just minutes before the Sterns boarded the ship to set sail to America to see if, by chance, Hertz recognized or could identify anyone in the picture. A short time later, the phone rang. It was Hertz.

“There are universal lessons in this production,” said Farrell Seymore ’97, superintendent of Opelika City Schools. “It’s a message of hope. It’s humorous. It’s funny, but it’s also very meaningful and touching. I think every student throughout the Southeast—throughout America—can learn lessons from the Stern family and from the community that received them. This is a universal story that should be heard.”

Heinz Julius Stern was born to Arnold and Hedwig Stern on Sept. 4, 1931. The Sterns lived in Westheim, Westfalen, Germany—the only Jewish family in a small town. Heinz’s great-uncle, Julius Hagedorn, a highly respected owner of a department store in Opelika, and his wife, Amelia, visited the Sterns in 1936 and tried desperately to persuade them to go to America.

A year later, after selling all their belongings, the Sterns were finally ready to go. Before leaving, family members gathered at the family farm to say goodbye and to take one last photo.  From there, the four Sterns traveled to Hamburg, Germany and, along with 330 other passengers, boarded the S.S. Washington, the last ship of Jews to legally leave the country. During their trip to the United States, the children “adopted” American names and Heinz became Henry.

The family settled in in Opelika. Stern (and his sister, Lora) attended Opelika schools. He played football and basketball in high school and graduated from Clift High School (Opelika High School) in 1950. Following graduation, he served in the U.S. Navy from 1951 to 1954 and later enrolled in Alabama Polytechnic University (now Auburn University), where he walked on the basketball team and studied business administration. Stern was a partner in a department store in downtown before being named president of the Opelika Chamber of Commerce, where he spent the rest of his career.

During all his years in America, neither Stern nor any other family members knew the whereabouts of relatives left behind in Germany. After the war, a college friend of Stern’s went to Germany to teach and took the Stern name with him to see what he could find. The news was devastating. Stern’s maternal grandmother, paternal grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins had all been deported to concentration camps and were murdered by the Nazis. The surviving family members were sent to ghettos and spent the remainder of their lives picking up the shattered pieces.

All his adult life—for more than 50 years—Stern desperately searched for someone from his family who had survived and was still alive. Then, in the wee hours of Nov. 21, 2004, Stern got a break. A friend emailed a link to a website that tracks Holocaust victims and their families. After literally thousands of failures over the years, Stern, who never gave up hope, typed in his grandmother’s name and for the first time something came up: a Fred Hertz in Durham, N.C.

Stern waited until daylight and called the stranger. He introduced himself and told Hertz he had spent years searching for surviving family. He asked if he could email a family photograph taken in 1937, just minutes before the Sterns boarded the ship to set sail to America to see if, by chance, Hertz recognized or could identify anyone in the picture. A short time later, the phone rang. It was Hertz.

“Henry, I’m in this picture,” Hertz said.“I’m the boy on the back row.”

The boys were first cousins who had thought for more than 60 years that the other was dead. They emailed and spoke daily by telephone.

Two months later, the cousins and their families would finally meet face to face for the first time since that summer day in 1937. With television cameras rolling, the men embraced in a tearful reunion in the driveway of the Hertz home in Durham. To this family, it was much more than a reunion. It was a miracle.

Hertz passed away in early 2008 and Stern died in 2014, but now, thanks to the musical production of “We’ll Meet Again,” their story lives on.

So how did this story about a boy in Opelika, Ala. make its way to the stage?

In 2007, Anna Asbury Carlson ’15 was given an assignment in her 11th grade history class at Opelika High School. “We had to write a paper on any event in history,” Carlson said. “’Big Henry’ was a dear friend of my grandparents—he grew up right next to my grandmother—so I was very familiar with his life. I knew all about him finding Fred, so I wrote his story.”

Stern loved the paper and gave printed copies to everybody he thought would read it. Through family friends, Carlson’s paper made its way to Jim Harris in Lincoln, Neb. An attorney, actor, vocalist and playwright with Opelika ties, Harris had always wanted to write a WWII musical but didn’t have a good story line—until he read Stern’s story for the first time.

“It was such a touching story, and it really brought home a connection to Henry Stern as a person,” Harris said. “I thought by using Henry’s story as the nucleus of the play I could personalize the events of that momentous era in a way that was understandable and relatable.”

The play is indeed powerful, understandable, entertaining and relatable, but to Pearl, Stern’s story is more than that. To Pearl, it’s very personal.

“‘We’ll Meet Again’ had a tremendous impact on me because Henry’s story is also my story,” Pearl said. “My grandfather, my Papa, was able to escape to the United States when he was 11 years old, bringing his three younger siblings with him. Like much of Henry’s family, and much of Papa’s family—my family—didn’t make it. But the focus of this story is not all about the horrible things that happened. ‘We’ll Meet Again’ is more about the fact that this family came to America, were successful and their family lived on. As has mine.”

More Alumni Stories