TO THE GREAT DELIGHT OF ALUMNI returning to campus for Alumni Weekend, the stately Miller-Ward Alumni House has opened its doors at last. This year’s reunion attendees were feted with a grand opening celebration at the Tudor-style mansion on Houston Mill Road.

Viewed from the outside, the house makes a striking impression. Its gabled roof and turret pose proudly against the blue of the autumn sky. In the William and Clara Redmond Gardens, the fading blooms of hostas and blushing dogwood leaves belie the beauty of the spring to come. The soft bubbling of the Warren fountain entreats alumni to pause a moment on the Oxford porch before stepping inside their new Emory home. Once inside and past the McLarty stairwell, overstuffed leather ottomans in the wood-paneled Walt Davis Clubroom are not to be resisted; visitors may grab a Coke from the vintage machine in the Class of 1968 Dooley’s Den and settle in for the afternoon.

The Redmonds, Warren, McLarty, and Davis are among the twenty-five individuals and two groups of benefactors (Oxford graduates and members of the Class of 1968) who are honored with named rooms or sections of the Miller-Ward Alumni House. In all, about seven hundred donors contributed to the building project, according to Jack Gilbert, associate vice president for institutional advancement.

The place is clearly a celebration of all things Emory. A quick tour is a difficult task: the walls are lined with beckoning photos of anonymous students and prominent alumni.

The house is named for H. Prentice Miller ’27C-’28G, who served as dean of the freshman and sophomore classes and was Emory’s first dean of alumni, and current Dean of Alumni Judson C. “Jake” Ward ’33C-’36G.

In the Prentice Miller Meeting Room sits the old desk of the beloved teacher, counselor, guide, disciplinarian, mentor, and dean to hundreds of students. As an instructor in English, Miller earned a reputation for rigorous training in composition. As an adviser to freshmen and sophomores, he was a realist who leveled with students and challenged them to do their duty. As dean of alumni beginning in 1960, he cultivated the friendship and support of former students. He continued officially and unofficially in that role until 1984. His handwritten notes of thanks, his roasted pecans at Christmas, his time for all those who wrote to seek help with their children or to remember old times, all bear evidence to his single-minded devotion to Emory and his students.

The walls of the Judson C. Ward Board Room are lined with black-and-white photos of a much younger Ward than the one still manning a desk just down the corridor. As dean of alumni since 1985, Ward’s counsel and consideration have helped interpret the new Emory to those who have cared for it for many generations. Ward joined Emory College as dean in 1948. In 1957, he was appointed vice president and dean of faculties and in 1970 was named executive vice president, a position from which he retired in 1979. He has received the Award of Honor of the Association of Emory Alumni (AEA), the Thomas Jefferson Award, and the Freedom Foundation Award. Through his intellect, humor, charm, wisdom, and his capacity to communicate, he embodies much of the spirit of Emory University.

The following are brief profiles of the benefactors who so generously helped make the new house a reality. From the reception hall on the house’s main level, a curving staircase leads up to the Tony Budd Lobby, named in memory of Townshend Budd ’52B. An investment banker and entrepreneur, Budd was the founder of a securities firm and a small window manufacturing company. He is remembered by his brother J. Coleman Budd ’50B.

An associate justice on the Georgia Supreme Court and a veteran of the Spanish American War, John S. Candler 1880C-1883G has been remembered in the Governors’ Hall by his granddaughter, Florrie Guy Funk, and her husband, F. James Funk ’41C-’44M. Candler’s brothers were Bishop Warren A. Candler and Coca-Cola founder Asa G. Candler. Candler was an advocate for the creation of the Emory law school. He served as the first president of the Emory University Alumni Association in 1924 and was a member of the Emory Board of Trustees.

The alumni career center on the second floor of the house is named for Lewis Lamar “Luke” Clegg ’25C-’31G. As director of admissions for Emory College, Clegg found jobs for many students and helped launch the careers of others. Says one alumnus, “When I came to Emory, I had no money and no place to stay. Luke Clegg and his wife took me in and fed me so I could go to school.” Clegg served Emory University for more than forty years.

The clubroom on the main level of the alumni house is named for Walter R. Davis Jr. ’34C, who earned the nickname “Mr. Emory” as longtime director of the Association of Emory Alumni. With his knowledge of Emory traditions and his capacity for travel, remembering names, and endearing himself to those he met, Davis crossed the South and the country meeting with alumni and making them loyal friends of the University. When Davis retired in 1978, Emory President James T. Laney named him Poet-Humorist of Emory.

The executive directors’ suite on the house’s first floor is named for Emory Trustee James L. Ferman Jr. ’65B, president of Ferman Motor Car Company, the Tampa, Florida, auto dealership group founded by his grandfather in 1895. He is a founding member of the board of governors of the Association of Emory Alumni and a past president of the Tampa Emory Alumni Club. He received an Emory Medal in 1999.

The suite of four AEA offices in the Godwin Center is named for Hubert O. Godwin; his wife, Georgia Adams Godwin; their son John T. Godwin ’38C-’41M; and his wife, Sara M. Godwin. Hubert Godwin practiced law, organized banks, and served four times as mayor of Social Circle, Georgia. John Godwin has been a practicing pathologist and professor of pathology at Emory, Georgia State University, and Morehouse School of Medicine.

The Gallery of Honor on the upper level of the alumni house is named for Cleburne E. Gregory Jr. ’32C, an attorney who served with the Georgia Attorney General’s Office and as a private attorney in the Atlanta firm that now bears his name, Arnall, Golden, and Gregory. During his career, Gregory argued several pivotal cases in Georgia history, including the famous “case of the two governors,” in which Ellis Arnall and Herman Talmadge disputed the outcome of the 1946 gubernatorial contest.

J. Sam Guy, for whom the dining room on the house’s main level is named, pioneered the teaching of chemistry at Emory and helped create the student-focused environment that remains a hallmark of the department. Guy, who insisted on teaching freshmen himself, was remembered by former students for “his inspiration, his encouragement, his advice, and occasionally his financial aid.” He served Emory for thirty-five years as teacher and department chair.

Contributions to the house were made in honor of John Hamilton Holmes ’67M, one of the first two African-American students to attend the University of Georgia and the first to attend Emory’s medical school. Holmes was a member of the orthopedic division of Emory’s Department of Surgery and later became chief of orthopedics at the Veterans Medical Center. He was named medical director at Grady Hospital in 1989 and later served as chief of orthopedic surgery at Grady. He was an assistant professor in Emory’s medical school.

The Center for Student Alumni is named for Clark Howell Jr. ’45C, a journalism major who served as business manager of the Campus. Howell was a member of the editorial staff of the Atlanta Constitution, the newspaper his family directed for almost a century. He later became a vice president of the Trust Company’s department of governmental affairs.

The gate over the walkway leading to the front of the alumni house is named for John S. Inman Jr. ’42C-’45M and his sons, John S. Inman III ’79C-’83M and Mark A. Inman ’86C. An obstetrician in Albany, Georgia, John Inman Jr. has helped bring more than nine thousand babies into the world. He served on the National Council of Medicine, a group of physicians and lay people who advise the School of Medicine. John Inman III now leads in the practice of obstetrics with his father. Mark Inman is an attorney in Atlanta.

Contributions to the house were made in honor of Herbert R. Karp ’42C-’51M, who for thirty-seven years taught neurology and served at Emory, Grady, and the Veterans Administration hospitals. He was chair of the neurology department until, late in his career, an interest in aging drew him to geriatric medicine. He became director of the Division of Geriatric Medicine at Emory and director of medical services at the Wesley Woods Center. He received the Thomas Jefferson Award and the Outstanding Faculty Award from the Emory School of Medicine.

The curving central staircase in the alumni house is named for Paul M. McLarty Jr. ’63C-’66L and Ruth B. McLarty, whose work in real estate law and leadership in the arts, religious life, and youth organizations are well known in Atlanta. Since 1988, the McLartys have devoted themselves to the re-colonization of the Alpha Tau Omega (ATO) fraternity, to which Paul McLarty belonged as a student. The couple has worked to re-establish ATO at Emory as a model fraternity.

Contributions to the house have been made in honor of biochemist Evangeline T. Papageorge ’29G, who in 1929 became the first woman appointed to Emory’s full-time faculty. She was appointed assistant dean of Emory University School of Medicine in 1956, associate dean in 1957, and executive associate dean in 1968, retiring in 1975. Throughout her Emory career, Papageorge remained committed to teaching, research, and quality of life for Emory’s medical students. She has received the Thomas Jefferson Award and awards of honor from Emory medical school alumni and the Association of Emory Alumni.

The gardens in front of the house are named for William B. Redmond ’27C-’28G and Clara Street Redmond, who shared a passion for horticulture. Redmond taught at Emory from 1928 until 1951, when he joined the research department of the Veterans Administration. He devoted his life to research of infectious diseases, particularly tuberculosis, and gained international recognition for his work. He received the Emory School of Medicine Distinguished Service Award in 1969.

The library on the upper floor is named for the Schley family of Columbus, Georgia. Francis Brooking Schley ’24M was a pediatrician and civic leader. Frank B. Schley Jr. ’50C-’53M, also a pediatrician, was an active naturalist, conservationist, and community activist. Philip T. Schley ’56M is a urologist and has been chair of the local school board. W. Shain Schley ’62C-’66M is chair of the Department of Otorhinolaryngology at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University and is otorhinolaryngol-ogist-in-chief at the New York Hospital. Robert S. Schley ’91M is an anesthesiologist in Miami, Florida. Alexandra Schley ’94C-’99MBA is pursuing a career in business.

The fountain at the alumni house is named in memory of Martha Malone Warren ’35L by her family. A native of Monticello, Georgia, Warren completed Emory law school when few women were pursuing the professions. She practiced law for several years with her husband, Julian Benjamin Warren ’31C-’34L, and managed several family businesses and a family trust.

Gifts also created the Class of 1999 Garden and the Oxford Porch.