There’s barely a branch of two-degree grad David Tomasko’s family tree that doesn’t trace back to Illinois.
“My father was the first member of his family to attend college when he studied civil engineering in the late '50s. My brother and cousin and I all attended UIUC for graduate school — me in chemical engineering, my brother in mechanical engineering and cousin in computer science,” says the Ohio Stare engineering professor and associate dean, who earned his master’s in C-U in 1990 and his Ph.D. two years later.
“Like many others, I’m sure, my cousin and I both met our future — and still current — spouses while attending school so it holds very special memories.
“My future wife, Amy Fieldbinder, was a ‘townie’ from Urbana — she hates that word — and many members of her family were actually on the staff at the University.
“My mother-in-law, Shirley Fieldbinder, worked in academic payroll and printed my paychecks as a graduate student.
“My brother-in-law, George Hubert, was an electrician, and my sister-in-law, Cindy Hubert, was on the academic staff in Physics.
“In the late '80s, Amy was a secretary at the Colonel Wolfe Early Childhood School, directed at the time by Merle Karnes. I used to walk over there from my lab in Roger Adams Lab to visit and during one of those visits, I brought her a box of chocolates — from Fannie Mae, no less — with a message carved out on the inside liner: ‘Marry Me?’
“So that’s my most special memory of my time at the U of I.”
And No. 2?
“Being introduced to Guinness Stout at Murphy’s Pub on Green Street.”
