Westminster College

Halley's Comet swings by Earth every 75 years. Opportunities for the Western Maryland College music department to get a new building come about as often.In 1929, the stock market crash dashed plans for a music building at the quaint Westminster college. But the school has finally returned to the task and next spring will finish a $1.5 million project that gives the department adequate space for the first time.It's been 70 years. Pardon the faculty for their pessimism."I didn't believe it until they started breaking ground," said band director Linda Kirkpatrick.

It's 2003. After three cataclysmic years of pestilence, earthquakes, hurricanes, fires, tsunamis and plagues of locusts, the planet is a horrible eyesore. But every dark cloud has its silver lining as two survivors, workers in a time-honored and expanding field, discover.Man No. 1: These are boom times for the gravedigger.Man No. 2: Sure beats being a desk jockey.Man No. 1: In the 1990s we'd have been unemployed, but here in the ... the, uh ... the, this particular decade, we've got it made.

Western Maryland College has its first artist in residence, a man who uses the arts to build bridges among people.Walt Michael, a WMC graduate, returned to the Westminster college four years ago to start Common Ground on the Hill, an annual music and arts festival that explores diversity and celebrates harmony among ethnic, gender, age and racial groups.He is director and instructor of Common Ground classes and has been an occasional student in such studies as basket-weaving and construction of didgeridoos -- wind instruments made from long branches.

The Baltimore Ravens are expected to return to Western Maryland College for summer training camp this year.And next year. And the one after that.Officials from the Westminster college and the National Football League team are completing details in a three-year contract they expect to sign within the next several weeks, said Bob Eller, director of operations and information for the Ravens."

25 years ago The master plan for Hampstead was heard in an uneventful hearing by county and town officials Tuesday. The only change in the plan was the addition of some 50 acres of "restricted industrial" land. -- the Carroll Record, Oct. 19, 1972.50 years ago Any Gettysburg college student who deliberately damages the property of any college campus will be promptly dismissed, Dr. Henry W. A. Hanson, president of Gettysburg College, warns in a statement published in The Gettysburgian, the college newspaper.

The Baltimore Ravens are expected to return to Western Maryland College for summer training camp this year.And next year. And the one after that.Officials from the Westminster college and the NFL team are completing details of a three-year contract they expect to sign within the next several weeks, said Bob Eller, director of operations and information for the Ravens."

Westminster High has named Frank Mantinaos its new football coach, replacing Tim Ebersole, who stepped down in February after two seasons.The Carroll County Board of Education approved Mantinaos' selection at its monthly meeting yesterday morning.Mantinaos, a 1990 graduate of Westminster College in New Wilmington, Pa., has spent the past five years coaching at Thomas Stone High School in Charles County -- four years as an assistant and last season as the head coach."I'm really excited about it," said Mantinaos, 28. "Basically right now, it's a time of evaluation.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- Former Orioles reliever Gregg Olson threw again yesterday for manager Phil Regan, who said that Olson has made great improvement since working out for the Orioles in January.Olson plans to throw for other teams, but is expected to return to St. Petersburg for at least one more session before making a decision."I'm sure we'll see him again," Regan said.'Regans' beat 'Foleys'In the first intrasquad game at Al Lang Stadium yesterday, played before a crowd generously estimated at 500, Regan's team defeated the group managed by Triple-A skipper Marv Foley, 5-1.Shortstop Jeff Huson had two hits, including a two-run triple in the third inning.

A. Randle Elliott, 76, a specialist in international law who once was president of Hood College in Frederick, died Saturday at the Coble Health Care Center in Durham, N.C., of pneumonia.Dr. Elliott had homes in Millbrook, N.Y., and Durham.He was president of Hood from 1961 to 1971 and of Bay Path College in Longmeadow, Mass., from 1971 to 1979.A native of St. Louis County, Mo., he was a graduate of Westminster College and held master's and doctoral degrees from Harvard.After serving with the Foreign Policy Association and the Institute for International Education, Dr. Elliott became an economic analyst for the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey in Europe in World War II and chief reports officer for the Office of Military Government for Germany at the end of the war.He was a correspondent for McGraw-Hill World News in London before returning to the United States to teach.

Dr. A. Randle Elliott, a specialist in international law and a retired college president, died Saturday of pneumonia at the Coble Health Care Center in Durham, N.C.He was 76 and had homes in Millbrook, N.Y., and Durham.Mr. Elliott was president of Hood College in Frederick from 1961 to 1971 and of Bay Path College in Longmeadow, Mass., from 1971 to 1979.Born in St. Louis County, Mo., he graduated from Westminster College in Missouri and held master's and doctoral degrees from Harvard.After serving with the Foreign Policy Association and the Institute for International Education, he became an economic analyst for the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey in Europe in World War II and chief reports officer for the Office of Military Government for Germany at the end of the war.Mr.

Robert Stanley Bower, the pastor of Harundale Presbyterian Church for more than three decades who enjoyed flying Piper Cubs, died of heart failure Sept. 11 at the Glen Burnie Rehabilitation Center. He was 89. Mr. Bower, the son of Irish immigrant parents, was born and raised in Niles, Ohio. After graduating from Niles High School in 1939, he enrolled, with the financial backing of his Sunday school teacher, at Westminster College in New Wilmington, Pa. He dropped out of college and enlisted in the Army Air Forces during World War II. He learned to fly from a student of the Wright brothers, family members said.

Robert Hill Hartman, an ordained Methodist minister and former chairman of the department of philosophy and religious studies at Western Maryland College, now McDaniel College, died Sunday of pneumonia at Carroll Hospital Center. The Westminster resident was 76. Dr. Hartman was born in Berwick, Pa., the son and grandson of Methodist ministers. He grew up in Pennsylvania and Ohio. In 1953, he earned a bachelor's degree from Oberlin College, and in 1956, a bachelor's degree in theology from Boston University School of Theology.

FORMER ORIOLES second baseman Bill Ripken can only hope it's true that what goes around eventually comes around, because he has issued a rather interesting challenge. Ripken unfortunately remembers that I was the Orioles beat writer for The Sun during a good portion of his Orioles career, and - as athletes are prone to do - only seems to recall that I occasionally was critical of the team's performance during the early 1990s. That seems like a long time ago to me, but it is fresh enough in the minds of the brothers Ripken that they have devised an evil plan to get revenge, and Bill was on the phone Monday explaining why it would be only fair that I went along on their new minor league fantasy bus tour (May 11-15)

Six months after McDaniel College announced its new name, many students and alumni are still coping with a bittersweet mix of emotions from the demise of their alma mater's former name, Western Maryland College. "McDaniel College is the best of all possible names," said Brian C. Griffiths, a 2000 graduate who had chaired the Coalition to Save Western Maryland College. But while he respects the administrators who oversaw the change, "that doesn't take the sting away. When I look down at my college ring, it's technically not there any more."

In a move reflecting trends of community colleges across the state, the Carroll Community College board of trustees approved last night a tuition increase of $4 per credit hour, bringing the cost to $79. Community college officials said the increase is needed to offset a $700,000 loss in state funds. The increase will generate about $200,000, the officials said. To offset the rest, the college plans to transfer about $190,000 from this year's tuition revenue to the general budget and is looking for other ways to cover the gap. Beginning this summer, the average full-time student - taking 13.5 credit hours a semester - will pay about $63 more, or $1,067 per semester, including other fees, college officials said.

Hundreds of current and former students at Beaver College in suburban Philadelphia thought they had the perfect new name for the small, private liberal arts college when administrators announced two years ago that the institution needed to change its name. Their suggestion, "Grey Towers University," was inspired by the 100-year-old stone castle on campus. It made the short list of six names tested in focus groups around the country. But it didn't make the final cut. "Although it was what struck a chord with alumni and students, people [outside the college]

A tiara sits behind a glass door in the president's office at Western Maryland College - a girly, sparkly crown of rhinestones and pink plastic hearts. On a shelf next to it, wrapped in clear plastic, is the new black velvet tam with the gold tassel Joan Develin Coley will wear today when she is inaugurated as the Westminster college's eighth president. Coley seems slightly embarrassed about the tiara, one of the few personal effects in the otherwise bare office she has yet to make her own. Being a princess is not exactly the image she wants to convey as the first female president and the first person to rise through the ranks of the 134-year-old college from assistant professor to president.

Halley's Comet swings by Earth every 75 years. Opportunities for the Western Maryland College music department to get a new building come about as often.In 1929, the stock market crash dashed plans for a music building at the quaint Westminster college. But the school has finally returned to the task and next spring will finish a $1.5 million project that gives the department adequate space for the first time.It's been 70 years. Pardon the faculty for their pessimism."I didn't believe it until they started breaking ground," said band director Linda Kirkpatrick.

It's 2003. After three cataclysmic years of pestilence, earthquakes, hurricanes, fires, tsunamis and plagues of locusts, the planet is a horrible eyesore. But every dark cloud has its silver lining as two survivors, workers in a time-honored and expanding field, discover.Man No. 1: These are boom times for the gravedigger.Man No. 2: Sure beats being a desk jockey.Man No. 1: In the 1990s we'd have been unemployed, but here in the ... the, uh ... the, this particular decade, we've got it made.

Western Maryland College has its first artist in residence, a man who uses the arts to build bridges among people.Walt Michael, a WMC graduate, returned to the Westminster college four years ago to start Common Ground on the Hill, an annual music and arts festival that explores diversity and celebrates harmony among ethnic, gender, age and racial groups.He is director and instructor of Common Ground classes and has been an occasional student in such studies as basket-weaving and construction of didgeridoos -- wind instruments made from long branches.