University of Delaware
Office of Public Relations
UpDate - Vol. 16, No. 33, May 29

         Trustees designate medal, honorary degree recipients
     
     The University of Delaware Board of Trustees voted to
bestow honorary degrees on two individuals and to present
Medals of Distinction to four persons, as part of its
semiannual meeting.
     Selected to receive honorary degrees were Dr. Benjamin
S. Carson of West Friendship, Md., and the Hon. Walter K.
Stapleton of Unionville, Pa.
     Dr. Carson currently serves as associate professor of
neurological surgery, of plastic surgery, of oncology and
of pediatrics; director of the Division of Pediatric
Neurosurgery; and codirector of the Cleft Craniofacial
Center and of the Neurosurgical Oncology Section at the
Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. He has received 18
honorary degrees and numerous awards including the
Appreciation Award from the National Association for Equal
Opportunity in Higher Education, the Certificate of Honor
for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Medicine from
the National Medical Fellowship and the Clinical
Practitioner of the Year Award from the National Medical
Association.
     Judge Stapleton has served Delaware and the country as
a distinguished federal judge for 27 years. Currently he is
the most senior judge of the United States Court of Appeals
for the Third Circuit, which is one of the federal
appellate courts and subordinate only to the United States
Supreme Court. From 1959-70, he practiced law with the
Wilmington firm of Morris, Nichols, Arsht & Tunnell,
serving briefly in 1963 as a deputy attorney general for
the state of Delaware. An expert on Delaware's corporation
law statute, he played a major role in the critical
overhaul and modernization of that statute in 1967. In
1970, he was appointed by President Richard M. Nixon to the
U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware, becoming
at the age of 36 the youngest judge ever to sit on that
court. He became chief judge of that court in 1984 and in
1985 was elevated to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
Third Circuit, which hears appeals from the federal
district courts of Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and
the Virgin Islands.
     Chosen to receive Medals of Distinction were
     * Karl W. Bor of Kennett Square, Pa., Distinguished
Professor Emeritus of Physics and Solar Energy who was
instrumental in the establishment of the University's
Institute of Energy Conversion;
     * Claude A. Bunnell of Longboat Key, Fla., a 1943 UD
alumnus, retired chairman of Bunnell Plastics Inc. and an
active volunteer and supporter of the University's World
War II Era Alumni Scholarship Endowment Campaign;
     * Charles S. Joanedis of Hockessin, a 1950 UD alumnus,
retired vice president of product supply and distribution
for Getty Refining & Marketing Co., a member of the Alumni
Wall of Fame, and recipient of the Alumni Association's
Outstanding Alumni Award who established an endowed
scholarship for students in the Department of Chemical
Engineering;
     * Mrs. John (Helen Farr) Sloan of Wilmington, widow of
the noted American artist and an active advocate of, and
generous benefactor to, the University of Delaware in the
cause of visual arts who has donated more than 1,000
important art objects to the University Gallery Collection;
and
     * Lloyd L. Thoms Jr. of Greenville, a retired DuPont
Co. benefit analyst who, with his late wife Dorothy, has
been a great friend of the Art Conservation Program, a
senior benefactor of Delaware Diamonds and who donated a
scholarship to the University (the Agnes K. Thoms
President's Achievement Award) in memory of his sister, a
1929 UD alumna.
     Medals of Distinction are presented in recognition of
individuals who have made humanitarian, cultural,
intellectual or scientific contributions to society, have
achieved noteworthy success in their professions or have
given significant service to the community, state or
region.