ELIZABETH J. TURNELL

Inducted: May 7, 1999

In 1949 Elizabeth Turnell left her mark upon DePauw, and indeed the country, by establishing (along with Dr. Harold Ross) the first 10-watt college FM station in America here at DePauw University. From 1944, until her retirement in 1972, she was the broadcasting matriarch at the university, turning out students who went on to successful careers in the broadcast, advertising and theater industries, and establishing a pattern for volunteer student involvement in a full-service community radio station that continues today.

A native of Danville, Illinois, Turnell majored in speech at the University of Illinois where she made Phi Beta Kappa and graduated in 1923. She earned her master’s degree in speech at the University of Illinois in 1931. Following graduate school, Turnell taught broadcasting and theater at Shorewood High School in Milwaukee, and then moved to Northwestern in Chicago to teach at the newly formed radio institute. After only six weeks, Turnell accepted a position at DePauw University, where she would teach broadcasting for the next 28 years.

The teaching and practice of radio broadcasting was a new field at DePauw, requiring a professor and adviser who was able to help the students think about broadcasting in new and creative ways, while maintaining a professionalism and commitment that would serve them well when they left to pursue careers after graduation. She was known to her students as a professor who, in the words of Bayard Walters ‘63, "exercised enough discipline to make students do it right, but enough restraint to let them experiment."

On the 50th anniversary of the founding of WGRE, it is fitting to honor the woman who infused the radio station with a sense of excitement, purpose and public responsibility that remains an integral part of the station today.

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