Officers and Board Members 2011-2012
- Jo Hackl, President
- Anna Katherine Freeland, President-elect
- Demetra Gregory-McKie, Treasurer
- Annette Garver, Secretary
- Carol Young Gallagher, Past-President
- Judy Alexander
- Terry Barr
- Linda Quinn Furman
- Kim Gibson
- Vera Gomez
- Mark Johnston
- Linda Kelly
- Terri McCord
- Mike Mecklenburg
- Mary Pat Minor
- Barbara Robertson
- Sarah Stephenson
- Philip Whitley
- Anne Williams
Bonnie Adamson, Administrative Assistant
Kristi Reed, Emrys Journal Editor
Anya Hollingsworth, 2011 Sarah Jane Tracy Hagy Emrys Journal Intern
Bios:
Judy Alexander
Judy, a returning Emrys Board member and a Past-President, completed an accounting degree at Clemson University in 1978. Judy was a partner with KPMG in the tax department for 10 years before joining Dixon Hughes, where she worked until her recent retirement.
Terry Barr
Terry is a full professor in the English Department at Presbyterian College, where he specializes in 20th Century Fiction, Film Studies, Holocaust Studies and Creative Writing. He lives in Greenville with his wife and two daughters. He has had numerous scholarly and creative nonfiction essays published in academic and literary journals.
Anna Katherine Freeland
Anna Katherine is a writer, currently writing grants for the Upstate Community Mediation Center. She has volunteered for various organizations in the past including United Ministries, the Junior League of Greenville, and The Children’s Museum, and has taught writing, communication, and parenting classes at the Detention Center. She currently spends most of her volunteer time at her boys’ schools. She enjoys distance running, reading, travel, and cooking. She and her husband, Jimmy, have two boys, Hal (6) and Arthur (3), so she spends most of her time herding cats, or at least it feels like it.
Linda Quinn Furman
Linda, almost a lifelong Greenvillian, graduated from GHS and then Furman University with a BA in art. She also studied at Queens University and UNC-Chapel Hill. She and husband, Earle have four children and three grandchildren. The couple renovated a century-old Arts and Crafts house on Hampton Avenue, where they live, and where Linda has her art studio. She loves to paint with acrylics on canvas, silk dyes on silk, make pottery, and draw with pencil and pen-and-ink. Her work has been shown at several galleries.
Linda’s “life-loves” are family, friends, art, nature, travel, Pawleys Island, yoga, her three dogs, and most recently, West African drumming. Local boards she’s served on include Greenville Little Theatre, SC Children’s Theatre, Greenville Zoo, and many churches and schools.
Carol Young Gallagher
Carol grew up in Anderson and moved to Greenville in 1972 to take a job with the Children’s Program at Marshall I. Pickens Hospital. She stopped working full-time when her son was born. Since then she has trained as a family mediator and done mediation, teaching, and consulting part-time. Among a number of interests, she enjoys reading, writing, and hiking, and hangs on to the belief that she may some day set up her studio to make pottery again.
Annette Garver
Annette is completing her second stint as board member and secretary of Emrys. She retired as an Assistant VP for Liberty Life in 1995 and has since intermittently pursued her passions for theater (acting and directing) and for writing.Annette spends summers in “paradise” – otherwise known as Orcas Island — off the coast of Washington, where she hikes, enjoys glorious sunsets, works backstage for Actors Theater of Orcas Island, and has just retired after nine very busy years as Volunteer Coordinator for the award-winning Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival.
Kim Gibson
Kimberly (“Kim”) Gibson is a self-taught photographer who enjoys writing poetry, singing and writing songs. She is married to a Greenville native and they have three lively children. Kim graduated from The University of Maryland with a degree in Human Resource Management.
Vera Gomez
Vera is a performance poet, writer and workshop facilitator. Her first collection of poems, Barrios Voices, was published by Stepping Stones Press in 2008 and her short story, A Dry Run, was a 2005 South Carolina Fiction Project winner. Her poems have appeared in Yemassee (2009), KaKaLak: Anthology of Carolina Poets (2006), Millenial Sampler/South Carolina Poetry Anthology (2005), Ties That Bind (2003) and Quintet (2003). She is a teaching poet through the Metropolitan Arts Council SmartArts’ program and serves as the co-leader of PROPEL, a high school mission ministry through St. Anthony’s Catholic Church.
Vera works as a writer in business sales marketing for a Big Four accounting firm. She received a BA in Television, with an emphasis in writing for Commercial/Non-Commercial media and a minor in English (Technical Writing), from Texas Tech University.
Demetra Gregory-McKie
Demetra is a Small Business Specialist specializing in accounting, payroll, payroll taxes and quick books. Demetra grew up in Greer, SC and is a Greer High School graduate and a graduate of the University of South Carolina with a BS degree in Accounting. Demetra is a mother of three sons: J Ryan, graduate of Furman University; Joshua, currently attending Tusculum college; and Jeremiah currently attending Presbyterian College.
She enjoys playing tennis, traveling and singing.
Jo Hackl
Jo is an attorney with Wyche, P.A., in Greenville, South Carolina where she concentrates her practice in corporate and securities law.
Jo is a founding member of the Upstate Children’s Writer’s Group and a regular columnist on writing topics for the Pen & Palette, published by SCBWI-Carolinas. In addition to her role with Emrys, Jo currently serves as Chair of the board of the Community Foundation of Greenville, and on the boards of the Greenville Area Development Corporation, the United Way of Greenville County, and Camperdown Academy. She holds a BA from Millsaps College and a J.D. from Yale Law School.
She lives with her chef husband and three children on Paris Mountain where she raises fruits, vegetables, flowers and many, many weeds, takes as many black-and-white photographs of her family as they will tolerate, and tries to write every day.
Mark Johnston
Mark is the author of I Love To Smell My Daddy’s Socks (Price Stern Sloan, 1997) and co-author of Secret Agent (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2005) and The Secret Agents Strike Back (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2008). He writes children’s books and teaches English at Greenville Technical College.
Mark has previously served on the Emrys board and his wife, Susan Cyr, is a Past-President of Emrys.
Linda Kelly
Linda is a graduate of Mercer University with a degree in English and journalism and of Converse College with a master’s in liberal arts. Linda is retired from Greenville County Schools, where she taught AP and IB English and Theory of Knowledge. She is presently teaching at Furman and is the author of several children’s books, including Mice on Main.
Terri McCord
Terri is a communication arts educator through the South Carolina Arts Commission as well as a marketer for not-for-profits and the arts. McCord is a juried member of the Southern Arts Federation and is a juried artist member in literary arts as well as visual arts for the Arts Commission. She has won numerous national awards and fellowships in writing, and her visual art is included in many private collections as well as museum collections.
Terri’s non-profit experience includeds event management, writing, and brand/logo/media development for the YWCA, Prevent Child Abuse, MAC, Upstate Visual Arts, City of Greenville, and SC Telco Federal Credit Union. She volunteers for Safe Harbor, and is circulating a new volume of poetry entitled Holding the Light. She earned an MFA. from Queens University.
Mike Mecklenburg
Mike is a painter working in oil and water media. He studied drawing and painting at Parsons School and the National Academy School of Fine Arts in NYC. He also studied history, architecture and preservation in college and graduate school. Mike moved to Greenville from NYC six years ago to live closer to his family. Since moving to Greenville, he has become active in local issues concerning urban planning, zoning and preservation. He volunteers as a liaison for his neighborhood PTA and reads to the elementary school children at the Sterling School and Stone Academy. Mike is also the Project Director for a small not-for-profit in NYC that develops educational programs in architectural conservation.
Mary Pat Minor
Mary Pat is a life-long resident of Greenville. She currently works as a marketing specialist for Greenville Hospital System University Medical Center. She graduated from East Tennessee State University with a BS major in Marketing/Advertising and a minor in Graphic Arts. She was inducted into the ETSU Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame in 2005 for advertising. She has served on the Prevention of Child Abuse Board, the Community Foundation Board, the YMCA Board and served as national alumnae officer for Kappa Delta Sorority. She enjoys being the wife of a wonderful husband of 25 years, and the mom of Lillian (18), Frances (15), Eleanor (15), and Jay (12).
Barbara Robertson
Barbara K. Robertson is an active community volunteer. She currently serves as a trustee on her children’s school board (CCES) and on other boards related to ALS. She is the author of The Hourglass Adventures, a middle reader series. Barbara is excited to become more involved in the EMRYS organization.
Sarah Stephenson
Sarah and Ruffin Stephenson have two sons and a daughter-in-law who are the loves of their life. Sarah is a 1973 graduate of The Medical College of Georgia, School of Physical Therapy. She practiced full time until the births of her sons and then went part- time.
In 1985, Sarah’s love for antiques developed into the formation (with business partner Mary Lawson) of The Polished Antique. The two enjoy searching for, researching and selling 18th and 19th century antiques, teaching about antiques and writing articles for /At Home/ magazine on the subject of antiques. Sarah’s particular interest is in Ming and Ching Chinese porcelains. She is an avid reader and enjoys the outdoors through skiing, gardening and walking her two schnauzers.
Although her writing has been primarily acedemic, Sarah believes it is important to encourage and support all writers with creative talent and enthusiasm, and looks forward to assisting The Emrys Foundation in that endeavor.
Philip Whitley
Philip began making sculpture in 1962. He received an MFA from UNC, Chapel Hill in 1969. He was a graduate assistant at UNC and has taught art at NC State, St. Andrews Presbyterian College, and at the Greenville County Museum School from 1971-1980. He was a faculty member at North Greenville University from 1980-1981. He owned and operated a frame shop/art gallery in Greenville from 1981-1999.
Philip has several public sculptures in both North and South Carolina, including one on Main Street in Greenville. He has exhibited throughout the Southeast and is represented by Hampton III Gallery. For the past four years, writing has been his medium of focus. He lives on Paris Mountain with his wife, Alex, where he also has a studio. Alex and Philip share their home with Olivia (cat) and two rescued Amazon parrots, Lucy and Pearl. He is webmaster of the Emrys website.
Anne Williams
Anne, a British immigrant, is a nurse and business major. Anne is also founding director of “The Great Scot Young Writing Contest” and Committee Chair for the Greater Greenville Scottish Games. Over the past years in Greenville, Anne has written and published The Climber’s Guide to the Carolinas, founded the Daughters of the British Empire, was a founding member of the Greenville Track Club, and worked on numerous community committees and boards. As prior director of the Children’s Hospital for GHS, she initiated and coordinated events such as The Children’s Miracle Network Telethon and The Elves Workshop, etc. Anne lives with her husband Arthur, an avid sailor, and they have three grown children. Currently Anne is attempting to write her first book of short stories.