Page 1 - Beta Alpha Buzz Winter 2016-17

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AsFsroocmiattihone APlruesmidneint
SBrothers,
erving as your Alumni
President is a truly
fantastic experience. I
have the opportunity to give
my time and energy to a place I love – Beta Alpha.
I witness firsthand the amazing accomplishments
of our active brothers including, most recently,
the Memorial Trophy, which is awarded to the
top performing Theta Xi chapter. Our brothers
continue to carry forward the legacy of Beta Alpha
at Georgia Tech.
As we embark on our mission for an improved
chapter facility, we also must reflect on our own
experiences at Theta Xi. The many years of our
chapter’s storied past – from 1951 until today –
represent generations of GeorgiaTech men seeking
improvement for themselves, their chapter, their
campus, and their world. The past deserves our
remembrance, the present our diligence, and the
future our focus.
I hope you will join me in this campaign. Our
aging facility is costly to maintain and will require that all college students must make – on careers,
significant improvements in the near future,
however, our vision encompasses more than just
immediate needs. This is our opportunity to build
a new chapter home to position Beta Alpha for
its next 50 years of excellence at Georgia Tech.
Make no mistake – we cannot succeed without
your help. I look forward to next great chapter of
Beta Alpha.
As always, our Alumni Board is here to serve
you. One of our primary objectives continues to
be developing and encouraging the relationship
between active and alumni brothers. Please
look out for future communications detailing
upcoming events. I look forward to hearing from
you soon.
Yours in the Bonds,
Michael Gilbert
Georgia Institute of Technology | The Beta Alpha Chapter of Theta Xi Fraternity
Alumni Office | P.O. Box 80828 | Atlanta, Georgia 30366 | Fall 2016
Alumni JIM KOELEMAY ’70
Spotlight
Editor’s Note: For this edition of the newsletter we’re shining the Spotlight
on Jim Koelemay ‘70. From his hometown of Shreveport, LA, Jim
earned his BS degree in Physics in 1970 and then his MS in Physics with
a commission as a lieutenant in the US Army in 1972. As an undergrad
he served as chapter President. Jim earned a J.D. from the University of
Texas at Austin Law School in 1976. Jim began his career at an Atlanta
law firm before joining the law department of the Coca-Cola Company
in Atlanta in 1984. Jim retired from Coke in 2009, served as General
Counsel for the Task Force for Global Health, and then moved to San
Francisco in 2011 to serve as General Counsel of the FRS Company.
He returned to Atlanta in 2014 and is now mostly retired. Jim has two
children – Kelly, 38, and Charles, 37 – from his marriage to his first wife, Dianne, who passed away in 2004.
Jim remarried in 2006, and he and Joan celebrated their 10th anniversary in July. Jim has served as Chair of
the Board of Trustees at Glenn Memorial United Methodist Church on the Emory campus. Joan is a nutritionist
and former professional chef. He and Joan enjoy golf, hiking, cycling, horseback riding, bridge, and traveling.
How would you describe your time at Georgia Watergate, the Black Panthers – the list could go
Tech? on. Lots of distractions. But to survive at Tech,
you had to shut all that out, go to class, and study
Wow, what a time to be a student at GT! In your butt off!
addition to making the life-changing decisions What is your favorite Theta Xi memory?
relationships, first jobs, etc. – and adjusting to (1) Playing never ending bridge games in the
being away from home and being an “adult,” dining room. The players would rotate in and
there was the civil rights movement, the women’s out to go to class, but the game never stopped.
liberation movement, the hippie drug culture all There were feeble efforts to ban bridge (the
over Piedmont Park and Midtown, the birth of nanny state writ small), but the bans were always
“classic” rock, the Vietnam war, street marches circumvented.
and protests, race riots in many major cities, the
moon landing, the Cold War, the assassinations (2) Meeting my first wife, Dianne, on a wrong
of Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, number. She was trying to call a friend at Theta
Chi, got Theta Xi by mistake, and I talked her
Jim attending law school at the University of Texas into a date that night. Game, set, match! We
in 1976. were married 31 years and had two kids before
she passed away in 2004.
(3) Watching the funeral procession of MLK
at Morehouse College in April 1968. The
mule drawn hearse with all the leaders of the
civil rights movement and all the presidential
candidates walking behind – Ralph Abernathy,
Andy Young, Jesse Jackson, Hubert Humphrey,
Eugene McCarthy, Robert Kennedy. I jumped
off a 10-foot wall, ran through the crowd, and
touched Kennedy’s shoulder! Six weeks later,
Bobby was dead, too. What a tragic year!
Koelemay (Continued on Page 4)