Mars Hill College - Notable Alumni

Notable Alumni

• John S. Battle, (1890 - 1972), Governor of Virginia from 1950 to 1954, served on President Dwight D. Eisenhower's Civil Rights Commission. Attended Mars Hill when it was a junior college, later earned a law degree from the University of Virginia.
• William L. Brown, (1922 - 2005), President and CEO of the Bank of Boston from 1971 - 1989. Doubled the bank's assets from $18 billion to $36 billion before his retirement.
• Woodrow W. Jones, (1914 - 2002), United States Congressman from North Carolina from 1950 to 1957. Served as the Chairman of North Carolina's Democratic Party Executive Committee; was appointed by President Lyndon Johnson as the judge for the United States District Court for the Western District of North Carolina in 1968. He served as a federal district judge until his retirement in 1985.
• Brent B. Kincaid (born 1931), retired president and CEO of Broyhill Furniture Industries.
• Dr. Dan Locklair (born 1949), Professor of Music at Wake Forest University, internationally-known composer who has won awards from the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. His work "The Peace May Be Exchanged" was performed at the funeral service for President Ronald Reagan at the Washington National Cathedral.
• Graham Martin, (1912 - 1990), Foreign Service Officer, U.S. Ambassador to Thailand (1963-1969); U.S. Ambassador to Italy (1969-1973); U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam (1973-1975). He was the last ambassador to South Vietnam before that nation collapsed and fell to Communist forces from North Vietnam in 1975. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
• Dr. Wayne Oates (1917 - 1999), psychologist and minister at the University of Louisville medical school who fused psychology and theology to create many of the practices used in modern pastoral counseling. He is also credited with coining the word "workaholic".
• Dr. Kenneth E. Peacock (born 1948), Chancellor of Appalachian State University since 2004.
• Dr. Tina Pippin (born 1956), Chair of the Religious Studies department at Agnes Scott College; she is an expert on feminist interpretation of the Bible, and in apocalyptic literature.
• Erwin Potts (born 1933), President and CEO of the McClatchy Company, the second-largest newspaper chain in the United States. Became president of the company in 1989 and was CEO from 1996 until his retirement in 2001. The company owns 30 daily newspapers in 15 states.
• Dr. David Price (born 1940), United States Congressman from North Carolina's Fourth District from 1987-1995 and 1997 to the present. After graduating from Mars Hill, he earned divinity and doctoral degrees from Yale University and taught political science at Duke University.
• Dr. H. Dean Propst (born 1934), Chancellor Emeritus of the University System of Georgia; holds a doctorate in education from Vanderbilt University.
• Liston B. Ramsey (1919 - 2001), North Carolina state legislator who served 19 terms in the state assembly. He was elected Speaker of the State House of Representatives four times in the 1980s, and was the first legislator in the state's history to have been elected to the Speaker's office for four terms.
• Jonas Randolph (born 1990), winner of the 2011 Harlon Hill Trophy, the NCAA Division II equivalent of the Heisman Trophy. As a running back for the Mars Hill football team he gained 5,608 yards from 2008-2011, a school and South Atlantic Conference record.
• Eugene L. Roberts, Jr., (born 1932), National Editor of The New York Times from 1969 - 1972; Executive Editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer from 1972 - 1990; Managing Editor of The New York Times from 1990 - 1997. In 2007 he won the Pulitzer Prize in history for his book The Race Beat: The Press, the Civil Rights Struggle, and the Awakening of a Nation.
• Lacy Thornburg, (born 1929), North Carolina State Attorney General from 1985 - 1993; United States Federal District Judge for Western North Carolina, 1995-2009.