Four Alumni Receive Davie Awards From Trustees

Posted on Nov. 21, 2013

The UNC Board of Trustees has presented its highest honor, the William Richardson Davie Award, to four alumni in recognition of their dedication, commitment, loyalty and service.

This year’s recipients are:

• David G. Frey ’64 of Grand Rapids, Mich., who also earned his law degree from Carolina in 1967;
• Karol V. Mason ’79 of Washington, D.C.;
• Dr. Hugh A. “Chip” McAllister Jr. ’66 (MD) of Houston; and
• Roger L. Perry Sr. ’71 of Chapel Hill.

The awards were presented at a dinner Wednesday at The Carolina Inn.

Established by the trustees in 1984, the Davie Award is named for the Revolutionary War hero who is considered the father of the University. It recognizes extraordinary service to the University or society.

Frey has put his skills as a fundraiser to work for UNC through leadership on key boards, cabinets and committees, including the board of directors of the UNC Arts and Sciences Foundation. A 2004 recipient of the GAA’s Distinguished Service Medal, he is a staunch patron of the arts in Grand Rapids and at Carolina, among other areas, both individually and through his family foundation.

Mason’s commitment to outreach and excellence began when she was an undergraduate at Carolina with her induction into the Order of the Golden Fleece, the Order of the Old Well and the Order of the Valkyries. After graduation from the University of Michigan’s law school, she joined the international legal firm of Alston & Bird in Atlanta and became the first African-American woman to achieve partner status in a major Atlanta law practice. Her commitments to leadership at UNC include two terms on the Board of Trustees as well as service on the Board of Visitors. Mason received the GAA’s Distinguished Service Medal in 2010, and she is a former member of the GAA Board of Directors.

McAllister and his father are the only father and son to serve as presidents of UNC’s medical alumni association and to earn the Distinguished Medical Alumni Award. McAllister made the largest single gift from a UNC medical school alumnus to the school, and in 2009 the UNC McAllister Heart Institute was created in his honor. In 2012, he also made the University’s largest single gift of art, totaling nearly 150 works; many of the pieces will be retained as a permanent collection and displayed in the Ackland Art Museum. McAllister also is a former member of the GAA Board of Directors.

Perry served two terms as a trustee, one as chair of the trustees and has held key leadership positions on numerous UNC boards, cabinets and committees, including fundraising chair for the $9 million renovation of Finley Golf Course, the Institute for the Arts and Humanities advisory board, the UNC Health Care System board of directors and the UNC-Chapel Hill Foundation board. He has supported the performing arts and the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center. Perry was a 2008 recipient of the GAA’s Distinguished Service Medal.

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More online…

• Trustees Honor Seven With Davie Awards
  November 2012 news report
• Trustees Honor Four With Davie Awards
  News report from November 2011
• Trustees Honor Four With Davie Awards 
  News report from November 2010

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