In memoriam

John Lewis Creswell

John Lewis Creswell, age 80 of New Braunfels, TX, died on 9 Oct. 2020. He was born on 21 Feb. 1940 in Muscatine, IA. He married Dorothy A. Mefford on 28 Aug. 1965 in Wapello, IA. Creswell served three years with the U.S. Army and graduated from Burlington Community College and Iowa State University with a B.S. in Agronomy. He received a M.S. in Botany from Western Illinois University and a Ph.D. in Agricultural Education and an honorary doctorate in Agronomy from Iowa State University.

Creswell worked for the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant and Iowa State University Extension Service. He was a Certified Professional Agronomist (CPAg), a member of ASA for 55 years, and a private pilot. He authored and co-authored 57 scientific and educational publications and received several recognitions and commendations. After retiring, he enjoyed hiking and birding and became active in several organizations, including First United Methodist Church of New Braunfels, New Braunfels Noon Lions Club, and the National Active and Retired Federal Employees Association where he served at the local, district, and state level.

Creswell is survived by his loving wife, Dorothy Creswell, sister-in-law Patricia Morrison, niece Theresa Kitterman (Kerry), and nephew William Morrison (Jodi). He was preceded in death by his father John Stanley Creswell, his mother Emma Mildred Creswell, brother-in-law Robert Morrison, and nephew Joseph Morrison.

Henry Fribourg

ASA and CSSA Fellow Dr. Henry A. Fribourg, 91, of Knoxville, TN, died 25 Sept. 2020 in Knoxville. He was Professor Emeritus of Crop Ecology at the University of Tennessee and member of ASA for more than 70 years (and CSSA for more than 40). He was widely recognized in Tennessee, the U.S., and worldwide as an authority on forage crops, tall fescue ecology, and pasture and beef cattle management.

Fribourg was born 10 Mar. 1929, in Paris, France, in a family with roots in Lorraine since the 10th century. As a boy, he worked summers on a small truck farm near Fontainebleau, awakening his eventual interest in agriculture. He lived in France and Algeria until January 1942 when his immediate family was able to escape from Vichy French police, German occupation, and the ensuing Holocaust, just one week before departure from Marseille would not have been possible. The family resided in Havana, Cuba where he attended high school, learning English and Spanish along the way. The family immigrated legally to the U.S. in April 1945, and Fribourg became a citizen in 1951.

Fribourg earned his B.S. in 1949 at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, M.S. in 1951 at Cornell University, and his Ph.D. in 1954 from Iowa State University. After earning his Ph.D., Fribourg served for two years in the U.S. Army Chemical Corps at Fort Detrick in biological warfare research and subsequently was recognized as a disabled Korean War veteran by the Veterans Administration because of his long exposure to Agent Orange.

Fribourg joined the University of Tennessee (UT) faculty in 1956 as the first full-time research forage and pasture ecologist in the Agronomy Department. During his 45-year career at UT, Dr. Fribourg initiated and taught courses and guided more than 90 graduate students in their M.S. or Ph.D. studies, many of whom later achieved outstanding careers. He also taught and led teaching and program evaluations in Turkey, France, Yugoslavia, and several countries in Latin America and Sahelian Africa.

Fribourg was a prolific investigator in forage crops ecology. He was one of the first to study the management required for warm-season annual grasses, such as forage sorghums and pearl millet. Prior to his coming to Tennessee, bermudagrass was considered a weed; he found ways of using this warm-season grass with clover and in combination with tall fescue as a useful and economical summer pasture for beef production. His publications in probability occurrences of climatic parameters for Tennessee have been useful not only to agriculturists, but also to engineers, industrialists, architects and planners, and real estate and tourism industries. He pioneered the use of factor analysis in agronomic research and demonstrated its usefulness for developing models describing plant and beef cattle responses.

Fribourg initiated in 1978 an internationally recognized research program on tall fescue toxicosis. This problem affects 3.5 million acres in Tennessee alone, causing a $1 billion annual problem loss to cattle producers. After retirement, he was senior editor of a 2003 ASA monograph on tall fescue, bringing together the expertise of 59 specialists from across the world, leading to proper management and new cultivars to surmount the problem.

He was the recipient of numerous professional awards, including the highest honor given to a faculty member at UT, Macebearer; UT Chancellor’s Research Scholar Merit Award and the Chancellor’s Citation for Extraordinary Service to the University; the UT Gamma Sigma Delta Award of Merit for Research; the Career Professional Award from ASA; and Distinguished Grasslander from The American Forage and Grassland Council. He served as Associate Editor for Crop Science, the Journal of Production Agriculture, and Forage and Grazinglands.

Fribourg’s professional publications were more than 430, including 130 articles in refereed scientific journals, 15 book chapters, and three monographs that he edited. He also wrote two autobiographical memoirs, I Gave You Life Twice and Escape to Freedom, describing his family’s escape from German-occupied Europe and eventual success in the U.S. After retirement, he presented many talks to university, high- and middle-school classes, church and civic groups about the causes and effects of Germany’s conduct of the Holocaust throughout Europe before and during World War II.

Fribourg is survived by his wife of 64 years Claudia, children Daniel and Renée, grandson Bryan, sister Rosette, and numerous nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by his parents Yvonne and Jean Fribourg and his younger brother Sylvain.

Robert Westerman

ASA and SSSA Fellow Robert L. Westerman, Emeritus Regents Professor at Oklahoma State University (OSU), passed away on 8 Sept. 2020. He was born on 20 Nov. 1938 near Mountain Park, OK. On 9 May 1959, he married Sharon Mires, and later they had two children, Brent who also worked for OSU, and Nicole now a resident in Oklahoma City. Westerman received his B.S. degree in Agricultural Education at OSU. Over this time period, he also served in the Army where he achieved the rank of second lieutenant and where he was a platoon leader and an accomplished helicopter pilot. He went on to attend the University of Illinois where he received a Ph.D. in Soil Chemistry in 1969.

Westerman began his stellar academic career as an Assistant Professor at the University of Arizona in 1969. Following seven years in Arizona where he worked as both a teaching and research professor, he accepted a position at OSU where he went on to achieve the rank of Regents Professor. He was the major adviser for more than 40 students that received either M.S. or Ph.D. degrees. Over this time period, he worked with the Oklahoma Legislature and various in-state commodity groups to secure state funding for nutrient management research, which continues today.

Over his career, he published more than 100 refereed journal publications and numerous bulletins, research reports, and popular articles. He was also the Editor of the third edition of the SSSA Book Series Soil Testing and Plant Analysis. Among his many accomplishments, he also served the Department Head of the Agronomy Department (later Plant and Soil Sciences), Associate Director of the Oklahoma Agriculture Experiment Station, and as Assistant Vice President for Agricultural Programs. Among his many products were highly productive graduate students who now work in leadership nutrient management roles all over the world.

Westerman was known for spending time helping others. His family, students, and so many colleagues all benefited from his ever-present positive attitude and willingness to work with others. He will be sorely missed.