Upper left: Gretchen Bellin, ATC; Allen Taylor, Transportation; Judy Bennett, IPAC;
Lower left: Maggie van Genderen, Financial Services; Patrick Koen, Biology; Nick Nichols, Industrial relations Center

Service Awards recognize Caltech family members’ years of dedication

Caltech will thank its employees for their commitment and service to the Institute at the 47th Service Awards ceremony next week. This honor is bestowed on the employees’ tenth anniversary and every five years after that. President David Baltimore and Vice President for Business and Finance Al Horvath will pay tribute to 158 loyal employees.

Of those, the one staff member this year with 45 years of service to Caltech is Nick Nichols, director of the Industrial Relations Center, a job he’s held since 1983. It was back in 1957 when he read an ad in the paper. “I thought ‘Gee, rockets, Buck Rogers. The new era.’ Though I was not a scientist, I had an economics degree.” Just out of college, Nichols started at JPL at a pivotal point in the country’s space race. The Soviets launched Sputnik in October of 1957, to which the United States responded by forming NASA and sending contracts to JPL. “That was a very exciting time. I worked on many of the space programs.” These included the Ranger, Mariner, and Surveyor unmanned missions. Later, Nichols moved on to participate in Caltech’s efforts to establish a technology institute for the Indian government and an applied research institute in Saudi Arabia before dedicating himself to executive education. “I like to characterize my time here as a number of careers under Caltech.”

Maggie van Genderen, the administrative assistant to Horvath, has worked here for 35 years. She remembers single-handedly typing up the general budget for the entire institute on a manual typewriter. Not bad for an immigrant from Holland with limited English skills. “When I first came to the U.S., there was an enormous language barrier. Caltech gave me a chance and I had to prove myself,” she says. While working full time and raising two young children, she took English courses at night. “It was hard but it was all worth it,” she says. “Caltech has been a bowl of cherries.”

Patrick Koen has spent much of his 35 years here underground, missing so many days of sun that, he says, “It’s felt like only eight or nine years.” He mans the biology division’s cell sorter and electron microscopes in the basements of Alles and Kerckhoff, where he makes infinitesimally small things look big. Koen fled the chill of Canada for Pasadena’s golf-friendly climate, and says he would pick the golf clubs made of Liquidmetal, a substance invented by Mettler Professor of Engineering and Applied Science William Johnson, if they were only included in the employee gift catalog.

The Service Awards will be held on Tuesday, June 4, at 10 a.m. in Beckman Auditorium, with a reception to follow in the Beckman Institute courtyard. The ceremony is open to the Caltech community. Following the ceremony, staff members with 20 years or more of service are invited to a special lunch at noon in the Athenaeum’s Hall of Associates. It will be hosted by Tom Schmitt, assistant vice president for human resources. Below follows a list of the staff members who will be honored for their service.

10 years
Ofelia Aliwanag
Dan Anguka
Lee Armus
Gregory Atrian
Gary Ray Belford
John Bennett
Lorianne Bowers
Ruth Brambila
Ronae Brooks
Daniel Buckelew
Judith Capron
Luis Cardenas
Chin Cheng
Suzanne Chiarchiaro
Ernest Croner
Greta Davidson
Andres Ductoc
Jesus Esqueda
Mary Flowers
Henry Frederick
Ann Frey
Phillip Gennaro
Eugean Hacopians
Joseph Haggerty
Gayle Hammer
Mary Johnson
Parandeh Kia
Jonathan Ma
Derek McCallan
Martin McCay
Kathleen McGregor
David Miller
Kathy Montes
Jose Nunez-Anzueto
Carlos Ovando
Shirley Pease
Linda Pharr
Cherylinn Rangel
Mauricio Retana
Victor Sanchez
Casimir Scislowicz
Stacey Scoville
Martin Shepherd
David Shupe
Anne Marie Simoneau
Lauren Stolper
Joan Sullivan
Carolina Sustaita
Regina Ude
Nagarajan Vaidehi
Lisa Winiecki
Hiroaki Yamamoto
Anita Yanes
Zenaida Zoleta

15 years
Ricardo Ang
Petros Arakelian
Mary Ellen Barba
James Bennett
Alejandrina Burgueno
Javier Cabral
Richard Canny
Carol Casey
Hector Chico
Tom Currier
Hall Daily
Eleanor David
Jose Delgado
Elena Escot
Michael Farquhar
Kathryn Finigan
Jesus Flores
Carol Garland
Patsy Gougeon
Allen Guyer
Philip Harter
Theodore Helland
Christopher Henderson
Leila Javaheri
Cesar Labarca
Lena Lenore
Sean Lin
Tina Lowenthal
Julie Malmquist
Mary Marsh
Victoria Mason
Jorge Mata
Josefa Meraz
Miguel Meraz-Villarreal
Paul Messina
Vinh Nguyen
Robert O’Rourke
Patricia Perrone
Inocencia Portela
Judy Post
Lloyd Roberson
Anastacia Rutherford
Lynn Salmon
Alejo Sanchez
Anthony Solyom
Rene Stone
Long Van Tran
David Werntz
Moty Zahavi

20 years
Pamela Albertson
Jesus Ayala
Thomas Brennan
Teesa Chmielewski
Timothy Conrow
Pamela Croomes
Maria Delgado
Michael Doyle
Kathleen Dutton
Rudy Francisco
Catherine Funaro
Rosana Gatti
Belen Gelle
Rita Gonzalez
Salvador Gonzalez
Jocelyn Keene
Barbara Mattenley
Rodolfo Mendez
Henry Ngo
Irene O’Bradovich
Carolyn O’Keefe
Su Potts
Vincent Riley
Randy Rose
Kathleen Scharf
Christina Smith
Virginia Tormey
William Wheaton
Lorrie Yamazaki

25 years
Michael Alexander
Nils Asplund
Wendy Brown
Lynne Bush
Susan Davis
John Fowler
Elias Gonzalez
Sandra Koceski
Adela Mendez
Lawrance Mossbarger
Sergio Mujica
Kent Potter
Skip Staples
Susan Yamada

30 years
Lawrence Begay
Nelson Ishida
Helen Tuck
Michael Walsh

35 years
Gretchen Bellin
Judy Bennett
Eloise Kennedy
Patrick Koen
Allen Taylor
Maggie van Genderen

40 years
Gerry Stapfer

45 years
Nick Nichols