The North Carolina Awards 1998

The Award
The North Carolina Awards were instituted by the 1961 General Assembly, which acted on the idea of Dr. Robert Lee Humber of Greenville, State Senator from Pitt County. The purpose of the Awards, as set forth in the statutes, is to recognize "notable accomplishments by the North Carolina citizens in the fields of scholarship, research, the fine arts and public leadership." It is the highest honor the state can bestow.

The North Carolina Awards Committee
Dr. Christopher C. Fordham III, Chairman
Joseph D. Rowand
Carolyn Collins
Doris Betts
John S. Stevens

Message from the Governor
The North Carolina Award is the highest honor our state can bestow. Created in 1961 by the General Assembly, the award is given yearly to men and women who have made significant contributions in science, literature, fine arts, and public service. On behalf of all North Carolinians I congratulate the 1998 award recipients for their outstanding achievements. We in North Carolina are grateful to these outstanding citizens for their leadership, service, and talent. 
Jim Hunt

Program 
35th North Carolina Awards 

Dinner Awards and Presentation
Sheraton Imperial Hotel and Convention Center, November 9, 1998

Welcome
The Honorable Betty Ray McCain, Secretary, North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources

Pledge of Allegiance
Captain D. R. Scheu, United States Navy, Retired, U.S.S. North Carolina Battleship Memorial, Wilmington, North Carolina

Invocation
The Reverend William L. Wainwright, North Carolina House of Representatives, Havelock, North Carolina

Entertainment
Anne Laney, Flute
Melanie Wilsden, Oboe
Michael Cyzewski, Clarinet
John Pederson, Bassoon
Andrew McAfee, Horn

Remarks 
Dr. Christopher C. Fordham III, Chairman, North Carolina Awards Committee

Awards Presentation
The Honorable James B. Hunt Jr., Governor, State of North Carolina


Acknowledgments
Video Documentation Program, Department of Cultural Resources
Centerpieces provided by Sandi's Florist, Garner, North Carolina
Wine provided by Biltmore Estate Wine Company, Asheville, NC, Jerry Douglas
Westbend Vineyards, Lewisville, NC, Jack and Lillian Kroustalis, Steve Shepard
Mutual Distributing Company, Raleigh, NC, Jimmy Enzor

Special thanks to: 
Midway Airlines
Ruder-Finn
Joyce Fitzpatrick
May McMillan Benson



1998 North Carolina Award Recipients

Public Service
L. Richardson Preyer
A keen intellect, generous spirit, and commitment to the common good earn Lunsford Richardson Preyer the 1998 North Carolina Award in Public Service. Throughout his life, this Greensboro-born leader has followed the old adage, "To those whom much is given, much is required." He has served his state and nation with grace and dedication.

Awarded the Bronze Star for bravery in World War II, Preyer built a reputation for honesty, character, and judgment while serving as a judge on the municipal, superior, and district courts in Greensboro. In 1964 Preyer ran for governor but lost in a second primary. He went on to distinguish himself in the United States Congress, serving from 1969 to 1980.

At present, he co-chairs the North Carolina Performing Arts Institute Executive Committee, a group planning a new regional performing arts center in Research Triangle Park. He is also on the Public School Forum and is a trustee for the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation and the Mary Norris Preyer Fund.

Preyer attended Greensboro schools and the Woodberry School in Woodberry, Virginia, then earned an A.B. degree from Princeton University (1941). After the war he left the United States Navy and earned a law degree from Harvard University (1949) and then returned to Greensboro to open a private law practice.

While serving in the United States House of Representatives, Preyer served on the Select Committee on Assassinations, which investigated the assassinations of both President John F Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He distinguished himself on other congressional committees; his courage and hard work earned him the Hart Award, which Congress bestows on members who best exemplify public service and integrity.

Education, economic growth, the fast-changing world, and the effect of increasing population on man and the environment were the issues that concerned this civic leader turned gubernatorial candidate, and these issues still concern him today. A devoted environmentalist, Preyer has served on the state and national boards for the Nature Conservancy and is a member of the Piedmont Land Conservancy. He also chaired the state's Coastal Futures Commission.

Long a champion of arts and education, Preyer has served on the board of trustees for the North Carolina Symphony, the board of directors for Davidson College, and with the North Carolina Citizens Committee for Better Schools. An elder and Sunday school teacher at First Presbyterian Church in Greensboro, he has taught law at Duke University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

In 1981 the courthouse in Greensboro was renamed the L. Richardson Preyer Federal Building in his honor. Among other honors he has received are honorary law degrees awarded by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Davidson College, and the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Preyer and his wife Emily have five grown children, reside in Greensboro, and enjoy playing tennis and jazz music. This year Mrs. Preyer is also receiving the North Carolina Award in Public Service.


Public Service

Emily Harris Preyer

Once described as "the sort of person who has a glass of cold water for the mailman," Emily Harris Preyer receives the 1998 North Carolina Award in Public Service for a remarkable record of humanitarianism and public service to the state. Emily Preyer's commitment to improving the lives of the citizens of North Carolina has driven her to devote years of constant service to numerous civic, cultural, educational, and humanitarian causes over the past almost half century.

Though a longtime Greensboro resident, Emily Preyer was born in Reidsville. She received a B.A. in English from Woman's College in Greensboro (now the University of North Carolina at Greensboro) in 1939 and an M.A. in English from the University of Virginia in 1943. From 1940 to 1943, she taught in Greensboro and Charlotte high schools, an experience that likely sparked a lifelong interest in education. After working at the New Yorker, Preyer served with the Red Cross in the Pacific during World War II.

Energetic as well as friendly and kind, Preyer stayed involved in countless organizations after marrying philanthropist and now former Congressman Richardson Preyer. Her alma mater has been a focus of her service. In college she was student government president and has since served on the University of North Carolina at Greensboro's board of trustees; as president of the alumni association, first chair of the alumni annual giving council, chair of its theater advisory committee, and on the university's centennial planning board. She was on the University of North Carolina Board of Governors from 1972 to 1977.

She has never shied away from a controversial cause. During the racial unrest gripping the South in the 1960s, Preyer publicly endorsed integrating public accommodations in Greensboro. She also served on the city's first human relations commission and on the Greensboro Urban Ministry board. In the 1970s Preyer helped found and served on the board of the North Carolina Nature Conservancy. She has been instrumental in raising funds to protect hundreds of thousands of endangered acres of North Carolina land. While her husband was in Congress she volunteered at Washington-area veterans hospitals.

In the 1960s Emily and Rich Preyer co-chaired the bond drive for constructing the Greensboro Public Library. She has served on the Roanoke Island Historical Association, the Greensboro Historical Museum, the Guilford Battleground Committee, and the North Carolina Symphony boards. She helped raise funds for the North Carolina Symphony during the 1970s and 1980s.

Modest as well as ebullient, Preyer has received many honors. In 1958 she was chosen as Greensboro's Woman of the Year, was inducted into Beta Sigma Phi in 1963 for her community service work, and received an honorary doctorate of law degree from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in 1977 and the university's centennial award in 1992. For her commitment to saving North Carolina's endangered land, she has received the Nature Conservancy's Chairman Award.

Today Emily Harris Preyer remains active in First Presbyterian Church of Greensboro. She and her husband Rich Preyer, who is also receiving the North Carolina Award in Public Service this year, have five children.

Literature

Kaye Gibbons

Kaye Gibbons receives the 1998 North Carolina Award in Literature for her brilliant novels that recount stories of southern women. Her characters are defined by their eloquence, compassion, and a steely refusal to wallow in self pity. Her work has enjoyed both wide acclaim and popularity, making her an important contemporary American writer. Firmly anchored in the language and everyday details of southern life, her novels explore the universal themes of love's complexities and the choices necessary for spiritual as well as physical survival.

At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Kaye Gibbons wrote her first novel while studying under southern literature professor Louis Rubin. When Rubin read Gibbons's initial thirty-page manuscript, he knew he wanted it to be one of the first books published by his recently established press, Algonquin Books.

In 1987, when Gibbons was twenty-seven, she published Ellen Foster. Famed southern novelist Eudora Welty praised it for its "honesty and thought and eye and feeling and word." In the spare volume, elevenyear-old Ellen tells of her harrowing childhood, strewn with loss and abuse, in a narrative voice filled with poignancy and grace. Walker Percy said, "Ellen Foster is a Southern Holden Caulfield, tougher perhaps." It won the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy and Institute ofArts and Letters, as well as a Special Citation from the Ernest Hemingway Foundation. Translated into several languages, the book has been adapted as a play and a television movie.

The early success of her first novel has not overshadowed the writer's subsequent work. The second novel, A Virtuous Woman, helped her earn a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship. A Cure for Dreams won the 1990 PEN Revson Award, the Heartland Prize for Fiction from the Chicago Tribune, and the Sir Walter Raleigh Award for Fiction. Charms for the Easy Life hit the New York Times bestseller list, and Sights Unseen won the Los Angeles Times Critics' Choice Award. The French government knighted Gibbons for her contributions to literature in 1996. In December 1997 Ellen Foster and A Virtuous Woman were featured on Oprah Winfrey's Book Club, making Kaye Gibbons a household name across the nation.

In her latest work, On the Occasion of My Last Afternoon, narrator Emma Garnet recalls her long life. Raised on a Virginia plantation by a tyrannical father, Emma marries a gentle Boston doctor, but the Civil War derails her happiness. She comes to see the war as a "conflict perpetrated by the rich men and fought by poor boys against hungry women and babies." The memoir ends with lines that could serve to sum up Gibbons's own writing philosophy: "Face it all dry-eyed. Say it. Say it."

Born in Wilson County in 1960, Kaye Gibbons lived on a farm in Bend of the River until after the death of her parents, and she eventually moved to Rocky Mount, where she graduated from high school. She entered North Carolina State University on a full scholarship in 1978, later transferring to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Currently, she is the writerin-residence at North Carolina State University. Kaye Gibbons, mother of three children and two stepchildren, lives in Raleigh with her husband Frank Ward.

Fine Arts

Robert W. Gray

Though a Florida native, Robert Gray has dedicated himself to promoting the culture and craft tradition of western North Carolina since he arrived in North Carolina thirty-seven years ago. For his pivotal role in making western North Carolina a nationally and internationally renowned center for crafts, Robert Gray receives the 1998 North Carolina Award in Fine Arts.

Gray attended the University of Florida in Gainesville and Tri State College in Angola, Indiana, majoring in civil engineering, but he left to enter the military in 1941. During World War II he served in the United States Marines and was stationed in California. There he met his wife Verdelle; they have been married fifty-four years. After the war, Gray worked briefly as a highway engineer in Florida but left the security of that position for the fulfillment of a crafts career. The couple then studied together at the School of American Craftsmen in New York. Afterwards, Gray became director of the Crafts Center of Worcester, Massachusetts.

In 1961 Gray came to North Carolina to become director of the Southern Highland Craft Guild in Asheville. His leadership enabled the organization to experience its greatest period of growth; today, it has members from nine states. Along with such partners as the Appalachian Regional Commission, the state, and community members, Gray was key in establishing a relationship with the National Park Service and creating the FolkArt Center in Asheville. Today, this center on the Blue Ridge Parkway attracts about 350,000 visitors annually and markets the work of artists working primarily in glass, ceramics, and wood.

A respected consultant and mentor, Gray generously shares his expertise and insight with individual artists, as well as local, state, and national organizations. He has worked with Handmade in America, Qualla Arts and Crafts, the Asheville Civic Arts Council, and the North Carolina Arts Council. On a national level, he has worked with the American Crafts Council; Handweavers Guild of America; the United States Departments of Education, Agriculture, and State; Aid to Artisans; and the National Endowment for the Arts.

In 1981 Gray retired from his position at the guild to become director emeritus. Still a leader and diligent worker for the guild and the craft movement, he often serves as ticket-taker at guild craft fairs. An anchor for North Carolina's crafts community, Gray has brought international attention to regional crafts artists while bridging the traditional and contemporary craft movements.

Gray's many honors include being named an American Craft Council Honorary Fellow and receiving the Mississippi Craft Guild's George Ohr Public Service Award, the Asheville Area Tourism Association's Distinguished Service Award, and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Southern Highland Craft Guild.

A tireless advocate for the crafts movement, Gray has been instrumental in promoting this traditional and evolving art form. Even in retirement, he and Verdelle continue to work with the guild and other organizations, promoting western North Carolina and North Carolina crafts. The couple lives in Asheville and enjoys traveling and consulting.

Science

Martin Rodbell

For his groundbreaking biomedical research into the nature of cells' response to environmental signals, Dr. Martin Rodbell receives the 1998 North Carolina Award in Science.

A native of Baltimore, Rodbell attended high school at Baltimore City College where he studied several European languages. During World War II he served as a radio operator with the United States Navy and the United States Marines in the Pacific theater. Inspired by several science professors at Johns Hopkins University, he graduated with a BA. in biology in 1949 and then earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of Washington in 1954. Postdoctoral work in chemistry at the University of Illinois stimulated his interest in the function of cell membranes. His long association with the National Institutes of Health began with a research fellowship to the University of Brussels and Leiden University in 1960, which renewed a longtime interest in European culture.

While chief of the Laboratory of Nutrition and Endocrinology of the National Institute of Arthritis and Metabolic Diseases, Dr. Rodbell made the discoveries that eventually led to his being the co-recipient with Dr. Alfred G. Gilman of the 1994 Nobel Prize in Medicine. In the 1970s he was researching glucagon, a hormone that reverses the effects of insulin, when he discovered that guanine nucleotides, a major component of the genetic molecules DNA and RNA, are important in cellular communication. This research led to the discovery of guanosine triphosphates (GTP) binding proterns, also called G-proteins. These proteins or receptors bind to the cell surface membrane and act as a biological switchboard, routing signals, such as light and hormones, from outside a cell to interior cell structures.

Rodbell's pioneering work opened up the field of signal Tansduction, now a major biomedical research discipline. Nearly half the drugs used today to treat disease function by targeting the Gprotein signaling process. G-proteins are involved in regulating key functions including protein synthesis, cellular growth, and cellular differentiation. Malfunctioning Gproteins play a role in the development of such diseases as diabetes, cholera, whooping cough, and cancer.

From 1985 to 1989 Dr. Rodbell served as scientific director of the National Institutes of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, then as chief of the Signal Transduction section from 1989 to 1996. Currently, he is an adjunct professor in pharmacology at the Virginia Medical College, in biochemistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and in cell biology at Duke University.

In addition to the Nobel Prize, Dr. Rodbell has been honored with the 1984 G airdner International Award, the Richard Loundsberry Award, which is conferred jointly by the National Academy of Sciences and the French Academy of Sciences, and several honorary doctorates. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy ofArts and Sciences. Upon his retirement, Rodbell was named a Scientist Emeritus by the National Institutes of Health, a title granted to select individuals who have served the NIH with distinction and wish to continue their research during retirement.

Dr. Rodbell lives in Chapel Hill with his wife Barbara.


Fine Arts

Marvin Saltzman

Painter and teacher Marvin Saltzman receives the 1998 North Carolina Award in Fine Arts for his strong, passionate, abstract paintings and the equally strong feelings he inspires in students. For almost forty years he has consistently challenged young artists while he created work that featured intense colors, brisk brushwork, and an inherent tension.

A native of Long Beach, California, Saltzman came from an artistic family. His photographer father created work that predated Pop Art, and his sister Florence inspired his own understanding and interpretation of art. After studying at Chicago's Art Institute, he received bachelor's and master's degrees in fine arts from the University of Southern California at Los Angeles (1956-1959).

Though Saltzman has said this formal education made him question academy methods of teaching, he was driven to share his artistic expression with students in Oregon, California, and Wisconsin. In 1967 he came to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he taught painting, drawing, and printmaking. More than just a teacher, however, Saltzman played a key role in building a renovated Department of Art, ultimately serving as its chair. Though administrative work was challenging and his personalized teaching methods continued to attract students, Saltzman decided after twelve years that he needed time to become a painter again. Like many artists before him, he went to Paris and began to create with a passion.

After painting forty-six oil sketches alive with bright and shining hues, he returned to the university recommitted to landscape painting. Saltzman's priorities now were his students, his department, and his work. By 1985 he had begun exhibiting again, demonstrating a new way of visually interpreting nature. By examining landscapes from different perspectives, he often emphasizes perspective and tone over shape. His work now can be found in the National Museum of American Art, the North Carolina Museum of Art, the University of California-Berkeley, and other collections. He has presented solo exhibits at the Raymond Lopez Gallery in Sierra Madre, California (1962), St. Andrew's College (1968), Belanthi Gallery in Brooklyn (1984), the Hanes Art Center in Winston-Salem (1989), the Greenville Museum of Art (1993), Raleigh Contemporary Gallery (1989, 1990, 1996, 1997), and many others.

Listed in Who's Who in the World, Marvin Saltzman has been a Ford Foundation Tamarind Fellow (1961) and received a fellowship (1979), research grants (1971-1972), and research leave (1991) from the University of North Carolina.

One of North Carolina's most influential art professors, as well as a profoundly gifted painter, Saltzman has inspired and influenced two generations of students at the University of North Carolina. His provocative critiques are grounded in basic honesty and a desire to make them feel painting from the gut. Students say his vision, direction, and support help them capture what they see rather than what they have been programmed to see, making them better artists.

A Chapel Hill resident, Marvin Saltzman has two children. He says his wife Jacquelyn, ". . . let's me be a painter."

  
Fine Arts

James V. Taylor

Described as "a troubadour of the '70s" by the New York Times, singer/songwriter and pop legend James Taylor receives the 1998 North Carolina Award in Fine Arts for his unique, mellow musical style, juxtaposed on often dark, confessional lyrics. Taylor has thrilled and inspired audiences with his music for almost three decades.

Though born in Boston, he moved with his family to Carrboro in the early 1950s. His father-the late Dr. Isaac Taylor-was dean of the University of North Carolina Medical School. His mother Trudy and four siblings were all musical, and James followed suit, studying cello and learning to play guitar.

Taylor began performing in his teens with his late brother Alex's band; he became serious about music when he landed in New York in the mid 1960s. He performed in Greenwich Village with The Flying Machine and even cut a record.

Fleeing personal problems, Taylor went to London in early 1968 and was discovered by Peter Asher of the Beatles Apple record company. Asher signed the young unknown to his first contract and in 1969 produced his first album James Taylor. It sold poorly in the United States, but Carolina In My Mind-an album cut released as a single and inspired by his love for his home state-hit the Top Forty chart. His tribute song to his home state is known and loved by countless Carolinians.

After wowing crowds at the 1969 Newport Folk Festival, Taylor released the album Sweet Baby James in 1970. Catapulted to stardom on this number one seller, Taylor began a distinguished recording career featuring both gold and platinum albums, including Mudslide Slim and the Blue Horizon, One Man Dog, Walking Man, Gorilla, In the Pocket, JT, Flag, Dad Loves His Work, That's Why I'm Here, Never Die Young, and New Moon Shine. To date, he has sold over 30 million records.

A founder of the folk-oriented, soft rock style of pop music, Taylor has accompanied other artists on albums including former wife Carly Simon, Carole King, Joni Mitchell, his brothers Livingston and Alex, his sister Kate Taylor, Simon and Garfunkel, Linda Ronstadt, Neil Young, Ricky Skaggs, and others.

Throughout his career, Taylor has recorded and toured extensively both here and in Europe. Audiences flock to hear his distinctly reedy voice, conveying a paradoxical mixture of resilience and fragility. Taylor's distinctive voice makes his songs instantly recognizable; each song is graced by a sweet melody, deceptively simple harmony, and the artist's flawless guitar work.

In 1971 James Taylor received the Grammy for Best Pop Performance, Male, for the song You've Got A Friend and in 1977 for Handy Man. His latest album Hourglass (1997) received the 1998 Grammy for Best Pop Album. He has appeared on "Saturday Night Live," "The Tonight Show," "Sesame Street," 'Me Simpsons," "CBS This Morning," and "David Letterman."

Now single, Taylor has two children and lives on Martha's Vineyard, where his family once summered; the beauty of this area has inspired the artist to champion environmental causes.