Page 59 - Academic Report FINAL VERSION WEB

FACULTY IN MEMORIAM

Dr. David Bell

Dr. David Bell, 1945-2018, served as President
of Macon State College and Professor of Philos-
ophy. He was president from 1997 to 2011. After
his retirement as President, David continued as a
Professor of Philosophy until 2013.
In Memoriam by Trip Shinn, Professor of Economics

In his long and successful career in higher I had a master’s degree at the time, and felt
education, my good friend Dr. David Bell held a confident that I would be offered the job. I drove
number of positions: professor, dean, associate to the campus of the University of South Carolina
provost, president, and let’s not forget part-time at Lancaster, about 20 miles southeast of Char-
tennis coach at the University of South Carolina at lotte, where Dave was by then associate provost
Lancaster, his first academic post. (and, presumably, no longer the tennis coach). I
was in need of advice. Dave convinced me that
Dr. Bell was the President of Middle Georgia if I accepted that part-time position and put off
State College from 1997 until his retirement from pursuing a doctorate, there was a good chance I
academia in 2011. During his tenure at the college might never return to graduate school to pursue
(now a university) Dr. Bell was well-liked, highly an advanced degree. Shortly afterwards, I with-
respected, and head of a team of administrators drew my name from consideration for the faculty
who oversaw a dramatic growth in enrollment for position and entered the Ph.D. program in eco-
a school that had only recently been a two-year nomics at USC the following fall. I came to Macon
college. His career successes have been duly rec- State College in 2000, reuniting with Dave and
ognized and noted by others. But I mostly re- Nora (who, by then, was president of Wesleyan
member him as the friend that he became. College).

I knew David Bell, who died last September, Dave had a quick mind, a quick wit, and a pe-
for over forty years. I first met Dave in 1974 while culiar obsession with Ludwig Wittgenstein, whose
visiting Nora Kizer, a former professor of mine impenetrable works were the focus of his gradu-
and David’s fiancée (later wife), in Chapel Hill, ate work. Having majored in philosophy myself,
North Carolina. David and Nora were in graduate I am well acquainted with peculiarity. And it was
school at the time, both completing Ph.D.s in Phi- my peculiar good fortune to be able to call David
losophy at the University of North Carolina. I have Bell a friend.
a vague memory of pulling up to a residence just
as Dave and Nora were returning from the ten-
nis courts accompanied by Nora’s two young and
precocious daughters from a previous marriage,
Caroline and Elizabeth. I was introduced to all,
and my long friendship with Dave began.

Although Dave and Nora had not been dat-
ing for a very long time, apparently the girls were
quick to warm to Nora’s new friend. One evening
shortly after my visit, Elizabeth, the youngest,
made her way over to the chair where David was
sitting, slowly looked up at him, and solemnly in-
quired, “Are you going to marry us?”

David helped me with my decision to pursue a
doctorate in economics. I was waiting tables at a
restaurant in Asheville, North Carolina, unsure of
where I was headed, and had just interviewed for
a part-time faculty position at one of the regional
campuses of the University of South Carolina.

Academic Affairs Annual Report 2019 | Middle Georgia State University 55