ATLANTA, Ga. – TAPPI has announced its 2013 TAPPI Fellows. Fellow is an honorary title bestowed upon a small percentage of TAPPI’s membership and is given to individuals who have made extraordinary technical or service contributions to the pulp, paper, packaging and converting industries and/or the Association. The following nine individuals have been named 2013 TAPPI Fellows and will be honored at PaperCon 2013 in Atlanta, Georgia, April 27th - May 1st. The new TAPPI Fellows will be honored at the TAPPI Fellows Luncheon, Sunday, April 28, 2013, at the Hyatt Regency Atlanta. 

Larry Anker, North American Pulp and Paper Applications Group Leader, Ashland Water Technologies – For the last 15 years he’s been with Ashland where he’s held various positions including polymer chemistry group leader, applications lab manager and field applications group leader before assuming his current role.   He began his career at International Paper’s Erie Research Center in the corporate papermaking process chemistry group.  

Larry is an active TAPPI member and has served as chair of the TAPPI Additives committee and Paper and Board Division and as an instructor for TAPPI’s Introduction to Wet End Chemistry course. He earned a B.S. Degree in Chemistry, Mathematics and Physics from Washington and Lee University and Ph.D. in Chemistry from Penn State University.

Charles T. Bohanan, CAE, Director of Standards and Awards for TAPPI and President, Association Standards, Inc. - Since joining TAPPI in 1975 as a Technical Editor on TAPPI Journal he’s served in a variety of roles including over 30 years as manager for TAPPI’s Standards and Technical Information Papers, including administrator for the U.S. Technical Advisory Group (TAG) to the International Organization of Standardization’s Technical Committee TC 6.  In 2005 he received the Leadership and Service Award from the TAPPI Process and Product Quality Division. 

As a member of the Georgia Society of Association Executives (GSAE) he’s served on the Board of Directors and as Chairman of the GSAE Foundation Board of Trustees, and in 2006 was awarded the Cliff Clarke Award for Outstanding Association Executive in Georgia, its highest honor. He also received GSAE’s Steve Styron Award and was named one of the society’s “90 Movers and Shakers” during its 90th anniversary celebration. He is a member of the American Society of Association Executives (ASAE) and has also belonged to the Council of Engineering and Scientific Society Executives (CESSE) and the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM). He has been active with several local organizations including the Seed and Feed Marching Abominable and Onstage Atlanta.

He holds a B.S. in Chemistry from Georgia State University and is a Certified Association Executive (CAE).  He also completed the Institutes for Organization Management course sponsored by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Bob Gallo, President, Voith Paper North America - After joining Voith in 1999 he held several senior management positions prior to becoming President of Voith North America in 2008. Prior to that for nearly two decades he worked in research, technical service, product management, sales and senior management for Albany International, Niagara Lockport, Wangner and Scapa. Gallo holds a B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute where he also studied for his MBA. 

He is currently a TAPPI Director and has been a member since 1979. He’s also served with several other industry organizations including PIMA, PAPTAC, AF&PA and ASPI as well as the Syracuse Pulp & Paper Foundation and Western Michigan University Paper Technology Foundation.

Patrick Gane, Vice President of Research and Development, Omya AG and Professor, Printing Technology, Aalto University - Gane has been with Omya AG for almost 20 years and prior to that he was Head of Paper Coating Research at English China Clays UK. He’s also Professor of Printing Technology at the School of Chemical Technology at Aalto University in Helsinki.  In 1994 he co-established SeGan Ltd., a print test equipment company, to further the development of the Ink Surface Interaction Tester (ISIT), a research tool used in leading laboratories worldwide. He remained as a Company Director until 2007.

In his career he has been active in a wide range of research fields. Early on he worked in research on crystal structure and liquid crystals, but for most of his career he worked in mineral applications in paper, paper coatings, paints, adhesives and functionalized fillers in plastics. Recently, he’s focused on the interaction of liquids with complex porous network media including nano scale phenomena applied to printing, environmental sciences and composite biomaterials. He is credited with more than 230 scientific publications and is a named inventor on over 150 corporate patents. 

He’s been awarded the TAPPI Printing and Graphic Arts Division Technical Award and is a two-time winner of the Swedish Kempe Prize, awarded for his work on the development of high speed inkjet print media. Born in 1953 and schooled in England he has degrees in Physics from Imperial College, London and a doctorate from the University of Plymouth.

Jeff Hamilton, Mill Manager, NewPage, Wisconsin Rapids Mill - Prior to his current position he was Director of Manufacturing Services for Sappi Fine Paper for eight years. In that role he was responsible for capital execution, global merger/acquisition, and operational and manufacturing support for facilities worldwide. Prior to that he held senior technical and management positions at the mill and corporate level for International Paper, Union Camp, and Champion which included working on the largest and most advanced fine paper production lines in the U.S.  

Jeff has served as past President and on the Board of Directors of the Paper Industry Management Association (PIMA) and as a member of TAPPI’s Board of Directors. He holds a B.S. degree in chemical engineering from the University of Maine and Masters in Administrative Science specializing in Organizational Design and Behavior from George Washington University.

Alfred C. Li, Research Associate, USG Corporation - He has been at USG Corporation for the past13 years and is currently in the process team for the Gypsum Panels Laboratory where he’s working to help develop new innovative and sustainable wallboard manufacturing processes.  He was previously with Beloit Corporation, which he joined upon graduation, working in the R&D Center on paper coating and head box forming systems development.  He holds B.S. and M.S. degrees in chemical engineering from the University of Iowa and a PhD in Chemical Engineering from Northwestern University.  

An active TAPPI member he’s served in many roles including the TAPPI/PIMA Conference steering committee, conference and technical program chair for the Papermakers Conference and TAPPI Engineering Division Secretary.  He’s been awarded numerous TAPPI honors and awards including the Engineering Division Leadership and Service Award. His enthusiastic support of and efforts on the TAPPI Fun Run Committee has raised sponsorship funds for student scholarships. He currently holds 16 U.S. patents, with 12 applications pending, and is a prolific technical paper publisher and conference presenter. He also provides peer reviews for TAPPI Journal.

Chris Luettgen, Senior Research and Engineering Manager, Kimberly-Clark - Luettgen holds a B.S. degree in Paper Engineering from Western Michigan University and M.S. and PhD degrees from the Institute of Paper Science and Technology. 

Chris has worked in various research, engineering and operations roles with Scott Paper and with Kimberly-Clark Corporation (K-C) and currently serves as Senior R&E Manager, North American Regional Innovation, for the K-C Professional Business.  Previous responsibilities included technical leadership roles in recycled fiber, greenfield mill commercialization, new product development, operations management, manufacturing coordination and enterprise transformation.   Chris has been an active member of TAPPI since 1986, has served on the Board of Directors the past three years and is currently Vice Chair of the Board.

Robert (Bob) Vyse, Retired – After beginning his career with MacMillan Bloedel he joined Omni Continental Ltd. where he was vice president and projects manager. Subsequently he was Director of Research and Development and Process Control for over 20 years at Honeywell Measurex Devron (formerly Devron Engineering) before retiring in 2008. He’s been named winner of TAPPI’s 2013 Gunnar Nicholson Gold Medal Award. 

During his career he worked on the development and application of various cross direction control actuators and technology; in particular, the combined application of steam and induction energy devices in advanced finishing technology. 

An active member of TAPPI and PAPTAC conferences, he authored numerous papers on papermaking technology, in particular on cross-direction weight, coat weight, moisture and caliper control. He’s also lectured at UBC and been an instructor for many industry courses. His education includes BS, MS and PhD degrees in Engineering Physics and Physics from the University of British Columbia, as well as a postdoctoral Fellowship at Centre d'Etudes Nucleaires de Saclay in France.

John Walkinshaw, Professor, Chemical Engineering Department, University of Massachusetts Lowell – He’s been with the university, his alma mater, since he was hired as a full time faculty member upon graduation. He was charged with expanding the capabilities of the paper laboratories and as well as the laboratories for the relatively new program in Chemical Engineering. An award winning educator, he’s received numerous graduate and undergraduate honors including the 2009 College of Engineering Exceeding Excellence Award. His work in research covers a wide range of industry application and product areas including extensive work in secondary fiber and where two patents have been issued on the ultrasonic treatment of biomaterials.  

A national TAPPI member since 1968 he began by attending meetings of the Testing Division. This led to his work to rewrite the Cobb Size Test Method which launched a 40-year span of work developing standards for TAPPI, PAPTAC, ASTM, and ISO.  In 2009 he was awarded the TAPPI Process and Product Quality Division Hunter Prize.

He holds B.S. and M.S. degrees in Paper Engineering from the University of Massachusetts Lowell (formerly the Lowell Technological Institute) and a PhD in Paper Science from Victoria University of Manchester in England.