University Of Virginia

Host St. Mary's College will be one of 18 schools competing today and tomorrow in the Senators Cup intercollegiate regatta on the Chesapeake Bay. Washington College, Salisbury, the Naval Academy, Loyola, Maryland, UMBC, Georgetown and George Washington are the other area schools that will compete in the Senators Cup. Completing the field are Hobart and William Smith, U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, Hampton, Ocean County (N.J.) College, University of Pennsylvania, Old Dominion, Queen's University, University of Virginia and Christopher Newport.

Staige D. Blackford , 72, editor of Virginia Quarterly Review, was killed in a car crash Monday, one week before his retirement from the respected literary journal. Mr. Blackford was riding in a car driven by his wife, Florence Bettina Blackford, when it was struck broadside, police said. Mrs. Blackford was being treated for her injuries. Mr. Blackford was a Rhodes Scholar, political speechwriter and newspaperman. He was press secretary for Virginia Gov. Linwood Holton and is credited with crafting the appeal for racial reconciliation that was the centerpiece of Holton's inaugural address in 1970.

Ceramic Uncles & Celluloid Mammies: Black Images & Their Influence on Culture, by Patricia A. Turner. University of Virginia. 238 pages. $16.50 softbound. A troubling, delightful, admonitory, incisive examination of images of condescension, patronizing and celebration in U.S. commercial and folk art before the beginnings of the civil rights era. Turner is professor of rhetoric and folklore in the African-American and African studies department of the University of California. She has done very interesting earlier books in the field, but this one -- concentrating on 150 years of conflict and coexistence among black and white Americans -- is particularly splendid.

Mr. Jefferson's University, by Garry Wills. National Geographic Books, 184 pages, $20. President Jefferson wrote his own epitaph, which are the only words on his tomb: "Here was Buried / Thomas Jefferson / Author of the / Declaration / of American Independence / of the / Statute of Virginia / for / Religious Freedom / and Father of the / University of Virginia." He founded that university, at great personal sacrifice, but he also designed its original core of buildings -- which a poll of professionals by the American Institute of Architects designated as "the proudest achievement in American architecture."

Daniel L. Senft Jr., a State House lobbyist and former board member at the Baltimore Country Club, died Tuesday of complications from polymyosytis, an inflammatory muscle disease. He was 79. Born on Halloween in 1922 and raised in Roland Park, he was a graduate of Polytechnic Institute and attended the University of Virginia for three years until 1945. He remained an avid sportsman all his life, playing squash and tennis and watching lacrosse at the Johns Hopkins University field. Mr. Senft served in the U.S. Army Air Corps in the South Pacific for several years before his father's illness called him back to the States.

They asked for donations and they asked for prayers yesterday at Oakland Mills High School. Mostly, they asked visitors to think about former student Rayna DuBose, because they could think of little else. DuBose, a freshman basketball player at Virginia Tech and a 2001 graduate of Oakland Mills, remained in good condition yesterday at the University of Virginia Medical Center, three days after she underwent amputation surgery of her hands and feet because of complications from meningitis.

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. - There was a time, say University of Virginia alumni, when the school's renowned honor system was a tradition that they carried in their hearts. But today, those same old-timers say, the system needs a jump-start from their wallets. In an unprecedented effort, the University of Virginia Alumni Association is soliciting donations for a $2 million "Honor Endowment" that will likely pay for ethics seminars and promotional videos, among other things, to bolster an honor system that has shown signs of weakening.

Eric Egloff, from Rockville, in the last threesome off the Little Bennett Golf Course in Clarksburg in semidarkness at 8:20 p.m. last night, brought home a 4-under-par 34-34--68 to earn one of four available places in this week's Kemper Insurance Open in Potomac. The remaining three spots will be determined this morning, when six players who shot 69 return for a sudden-death playoff. They are Paul Dickonson, Jason Enloe, Jerry Guillion, former PGA tour player Omar Uresti, and current Buy.com Tour players Anthony Painter and Chris Starkjohann.

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. -- Researchers at the University of Virginia Health System have received a grant of $5.1 million over five years from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disease, part of the National Institutes of Health. The grant will fund a multidisciplinary Program Project to begin to develop a cure for Crohn's disease by isolating new treatment targets. "To date, no one has been able to determine exactly what causes Crohn's disease, and this has limited the ability of researchers to develop successful treatments.

Towson Catholic's Keith Jenifer, one of the Baltimore area's best high school basketball players last season, has announced his intention to play at Virginia despite interest from Maryland and several other colleges. Jenifer, who will first attend Hargraves Military Academy in Chatham, Va., for the coming school year, spoke of his decision at a tournament in Las Vegas. The 6-2 guard, who expects to enter Virginia in 2001, averaged 18.5 points, 5.4 rebounds, 4.5 assists and 2.5 steals for Towson Catholic last season.