Tom Swift grew up with a Princeton tradition in close range: His father, Class of 1929, had scaled Nassau Hall with a roommate and successfully absconded with the bell clapper. Perhaps it was fate that Tom would one day join the Princetoniana Committee, founded in 1981 by the Alumni Council as a way to celebrate and preserve the University’s traditions. 

After earning his undergraduate degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton, then a master’s degree in mechanical engineering at Stanford and his MBA at University of Michigan, Tom built a career in management, working in high-tech industries. When he stepped away from corporate life in 2007 and began to explore new pursuits, he connected with the Princeton Area Alumni Association (PA3). There, a friend asked him to help with an oral history project about alumni who served in World War II. Soon Tom became a member of the Princetoniana Committee. 

In 2015, he became vice chair; in 2017, he was selected as chair. 

That was when Tom had an idea that would shape his work with the committee until the present. He and Bambi Tsui ’09 created the virtual Princetoniana Museum, which now includes more than 5,000 artifacts and entries, all of which Tom, as chief curator, has edited and formatted. As alumni and friends produce stories and find artifacts — including a 16-millimeter film of the 1930 P-rade — Tom works to keep Princeton’s history alive by creating and sharing digital content with the widest possible audience. 

As president of PA3 since 2019, Tom has brought range and imagination to alumni events. He has organized educational and cultural programs and managed a First Friday lunch series featuring graduate student speakers. During the pandemic, he kept the community connected through Zoom gatherings and online wine tastings. Recently, he reimagined the regional association’s annual dinner as a less formal affair; the event now draws a broad mix of multigenerational alumni. 

Tom has also been devoted to the Class of 1976. Literally going the extra miles, he organized a Mount Princeton hike for their 40th Reunion, providing a monthslong training schedule for climbers. Tom delivered the welcome address to 1976’s grandchild Class of 2026 at the 2022 Pre-rade. He currently serves as assistant class treasurer and is co-chair of the Reunion P-rade committee for the Class of 1976, a job he diplomatically describes as one with “a lot of moving parts,” from contracting bands to creating signs. 

Tom is well versed in marching orders. Since 2012, Tom has served as a P-rade marshal, patiently stewarding Reunions crowds. For his steadfast Reunions service, he was recently inducted into the Society of the Claw. As an ambassador with the Alumni Schools Committee over the years, Tom has also helped introduce scores of students to the university he loves. 

Tom, for your dedication to keeping Princeton’s traditions alive for all alumni and for strengthening our bonds of community in the process, we proudly present you with this Award for Service to Princeton. 

Lily Partridge came to Princeton as a first-generation college student and became one of just two women in the Class of ’82 to major in chemical engineering. She flourished academically, but later wished she had not spent so much of her campus experience studying in the basement of E-Quad. As an alum, she has advised others — including her two children — to “take all the opportunities that Princeton has to offer.” 

Lily has been taking those opportunities for 36 years. While her career path ranged from airline operations to marketing to education, in 1990 Lily began volunteering with the Alumni Schools Committee (ASC). It was the beginning of many connections to follow. The chair of her Northwestern New Jersey ASC region became a mentor and a friend who passed Lily the leadership baton in 2010. 

The numbers tell part of the story of Lily’s success: Her ASC team invariably meets 100% of their applicant interview requests. This year, they conducted 370 interviews — 32% more than the year before. In 2016, Lily accepted the S. Barksdale Penick, Jr. Award recognizing her region’s exceptional ASC work. 

Lily’s winning philosophy includes far more than metrics, however; personal connection is her focus. Draped in orange, she has attended countless college fairs, encouraging students to dare to imagine big dreams. She crafts personalized emails to other volunteers, carefully matches interviewers with applicants and ceaselessly works to connect volunteers with leadership roles in which they will shine. Lily builds community by cultivating long and supportive relationships. A student she met at a college fair — and persuaded to apply — is now one of her ASC co-chairs. 

Lily has continued to expand her own volunteer roles. Twelve years ago, she joined the Princeton Schools Committee (PSC) where she mentors ASC chairs across the globe. In 2021, she was honored with the Spencer J. Reynolds ’61 Award, presented each year to a Princeton Schools Committee member who, while volunteering for the PSC, demonstrates the qualities of inclusiveness, loyalty, reliability, and above all, kindness. She serves on the board of her regional association, the Princeton Club of Northwestern New Jersey. For the Class of 1982, she is an elected officer, co-chairs the community service effort for their 45th Reunion and serves on the Annual Giving participation team. 

She is also a force in the Princeton Women’s Network. In 2017, Lily co-founded PWN’s Northern New Jersey chapter. As vice chair of the PWN global advisory council, she plans an annual Reunions reception and organized a mentoring program piloted in Atlanta. 

Lily describes the Princeton community as a fabric she threads connections through. When she learned that the alumni community had grown to more than 100,000 Tigers, she thought, “Well, I probably won’t be able to meet them all. But I can try.” 

Lily, for weaving so many Tigers together with such warmth and care, and for encouraging promising students to discover Princeton, we are honored to present you with this Award for Service to Princeton.

Anthony “Ant” Pappenfus ’13 drove a golf cart in the P-rade for the Old Guard the first time he attended Reunions. The alumni community’s rich traditions immediately appealed to him, and he’s never stopped giving back. 

Ant’s first visit to campus was after he’d learned he was admitted. As he and his family flew from Wisconsin for Princeton Preview, he carried a card for the Admission office in his backpack; he’d checked yes before they even left home. What they learned about the University’s generous financial aid when they arrived on campus was transformative — it made that yes possible. 

Ant dove into campus life with enthusiasm. He joined the sailing team and Ivy Club and majored in architecture. After graduation, he moved to New York City and began a career in finance. Princeton remained on his mind and in his heart. 

Ant was a member of his senior class pledge committee and served as class agent for Annual Giving for five years after graduation. He volunteered as finance chair for his 5th Reunion — helping the Class of 2013 win the Clancy Trophy for the best-planned major reunion. He was also elected class president that year. Ant began devising creative ways to engage classmates; he recruited more officers, including for the new position of class affairs chair. He sent emails on Veterans Day thanking classmates with military service. 

In 2018, he began serving on the Annual Giving Committee. His service on the Alumni Council began in 2020, first as an appointed at-large member and then as an elected member of the Class Affairs Committee where he led an effort to create a new class officer role focused on diversity and inclusion. In 2025, he was appointed chair of the Class Affairs Committee and has helped begin a formal collaboration between Annual Giving class agents and class officers. For his 10th Reunion, he spearheaded a multiclass community service event in his role as president, and also served as Annual Giving special gifts chair. In 2023, Ant received Annual Giving’s inaugural Jim Lebenthl ’49 Young Alumni Service Award. He continues to serve on 2013’s Annual Giving participation team. 

Ant served on the Task Force on Recent Alumni Engagement, a year-long effort that helped shape how Princeton engages younger graduates. As president of the alumni board for Princeton Sailing, Ant has advanced access and inclusion for the student-run team and helped raise funds for a new fleet. He serves as recent alumni co-chair for the Princeton Club of San Diego, where he relocated with his wife, Ashley Barclift Pappenfus ’14, during the pandemic. Additionally, he has interviewed more than 100 prospective students for the Alumni Schools Committee and represents the Class of 2013 on the board of the Class of 1978 Foundation, which provides grants to students to participate in community service projects. 

Anthony, for your creative and generous service — and for showing recent generations of Tigers how expansive, joyful and deeply connected alumni life can be — we present you with this Award for Service to Princeton. 

Tom Reed grew up in Trenton and cherishes early memories of visiting the Princeton campus with his father, a chemist. After graduating from Yale, Phi Beta Kappa, Tom returned to New Jersey and earned a Master of Public Administration at what is now the School of Public and International Affairs (SPIA), focusing on urban affairs. Although he was on campus for only two years, Tom’s time at Princeton was pivotal to his career; in gratitude, he has devoted thousands of volunteer hours to the Association of Princeton Graduate Alumni. 

Tom appreciated the creative thinking of Princeton professors including Uwe Reinhardt and Paul Ylvisaker, and the M.P.A. program’s emphasis on exposure to real-life issues resonated with him. After graduation, Tom built a career in New York City government — first as an evaluator of drug treatment plans and later as an evaluation director of health services under contract with the city’s Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. When the computer age dawned, he dove into graphic design, developing public health materials and then going on to teach computer graphics applications at New York’s New School/Parsons for more than 25 years. 

Alongside his academic experiences and as his career progressed, Tom was always drawing and creating. At Princeton, he won a contest to name the new bar in Procter Hall, then a second contest to design a logo for the Debasement Bar, or DBar. Soon after graduation, he worked with SPIA administrators and faculty to produce a calendar featuring Tom’s contemporary political cartoons. 

For more than 20 years, Tom has channeled his wit and craft into volunteer work for the Association of Princeton Graduate Alumni, serving on APGA’s Reunions Committee and creating whimsical logos used for banners, T-shirts and more to carry out a selected theme, such as tigers playing in a fife-and-drum corps, tigers stargazing atop Cleveland Tower and tigers wearing P-rade marshal-worthy Da Vinci caps. The committee work begins each fall. This past winter, Tom kept the 2026 Reunions artwork moving forward despite a broken hip that called for surgery and rehabilitation. In 2011, Tom was inducted into the Society of the Claw for his Reunions volunteerism. 

His Princeton-related pieces are archived at Seely G. Mudd Manuscript Library. 

Tom, for tiger illustrations that bring joy to Reunions, for reinforcing a sense of belonging for graduate alumni at Reunions and for creating Princeton-inspired artwork that will last long after the banners come down, we are proud to present you with this Award for Service to Princeton. 
 

• 2024 - Robert Gleason ’87; Erica McGibbon ’07; Beverly Randez ’94; Frederick Strobel ’74 P08 P11
• 2023 - J. William “Bill” Charrier ’69; Douglas Jin Chin ’83 P21; Douglas Massick ’93 S93 P25
• 2022 - Itohowo E. Ekpoudom ’03, Richard A. Just ’01 S*04, Colleen P. Kelly ’77 S77 P10 P14, Robert B. Loveman ’69
• 2021 - Fritz Cammerzell ’72 P25, Susan Katzmann Horner ’86 S79 P20, Laurence Latimer *01, Nancy Lin ’77 S76 P10
• 2020 - Alfred L. Bush^; Carol A. Obertubbesing ’73 W71, Sue Pierson h67 h74 h81 h83 h87 h88 h93, Bambi Tsui ’09
• 2019 - Gwen L. Feder ’78 P21, Rose Li *92 P18, Lauren McKenna Surzyn ’07, Masakazu (Max) Tsumuraya *81
• 2018 - Charles C. Freyer ’69, Jean S. Hendry *80, James M. McPherson h57 h64 h69 h70 h72 H14, Mika Provata-Carlone *02
• 2017 - Susan Conger-Austin *83, Kendall L. Crolius ’76, Anthony M. Fittizzi, Jr. ’97, Judith McCartin Scheide W36 P84 h28 h31 h32 h34 h36 h37 h40 h43 h70^
• 2016 - Charles J. Plohn Jr. ’66, William F. Landrigan ’76, Gary M. King ’79, Gary K. Pai ’99
• 2015 - Thomas F. Fleming Jr. ’69 P00 P01, Patricia L. Irvin ’76, Shawn R. Cowls ’87, Kristin Alyea Epstein ’97
• 2014 - Wesley Wright Jr. ’51 P83 P90 h83, Vsevolod A. Onyshkevych ’83, Debbie Scott Williams ’84, Anthony J. Fiori *03
• 2013 - Rosalie Wedmid Norair ’76 S76 P04 P07, Charlene Huang Olson ’88, Lee L. Dudka *77, Jeffrey A. Vinikoor ’03
• 2012 - David T. Fisher ’69, Isabel K. McGinty *82 P12, Catherine J. Toppin ’02, Robert D. Varrin ’56 *57 P78 P80 P81 g10
• 2011 - George A. Brakeley III ’61 , George L. Bustin ’70 P08, Valerie Kelly ’84
• 2010 - Jotham Johnson ’64^, Gregg A. Lange ’70, Jean M. Telljohann ’81
• 2009 - J. Andrew Cowherd ’74 P07, Richard G. Williams *72 h78 h83 h02^, Elise P. Wright ’83
• 2008 - Carol Barash *89, Melvin R. McCray Jr. ’74, Duncan W. Van Dusen ’58^
• 2007 - April A. Chou ’96, John R. Emery ’52^, Robert B. Hollander ’55^, William K. Selden ’34^
• 2006 - Kenneth M. Bruce ’83, Jon D. Hlafter ’61 *63 MFA, Paul G. Sittenfeld ’69^
• 2005 - Don M. Betterton h60, Daniel P. Lopresti *83, *84, *87, Carl R. Yudell ’75
• 2004 - John V. Fleming *63, Charles H. Rose ’50, Henry Von Kohorn ’66
• 2003 - Mitsuya Goto *56, Herbert W. Hobler ’44^, Robert B. Rodgers ’56^
• 2002 - Robert Gibby ’36^, Linda Knights ’77, Oren Pollock *51^
• 2001 - John Fish ’55^, Norman Itzkowitz *59^, H. Kirk Unruh ’70
• 2000 - Alfred Bates h45, Lisa & Donald Drakeman *88 S*88, Elizabeth Osborne S50 h36^, Jolanne Stanton '77
• 1999 - Nicholas Allard ’74, Patricia Marks *03, Brian McDonald ’83
• 1998 - Elizabeth Duffy ’88, James Floyd ’69, Leonard Milberg ’53
• 1997 - Hannah P. Fox W39^, Peter T. Milano ’55^, Melinda W. Varian S63
• 1996 - Carl Fields^, Robert S. Miner Jr. *56^, Kenneth C. Scasserra ’61^
• 1995 - Dolores Chavez de Daigle ’76, Warren Elmer Jr. ’42^, Douglas Nadeau ’62^
• 1994 - Marvin Bressler h68, 82^, Nancy and Larry Gutstein P87,90,96,96^, Peter G. Smith '46^
• 1993 - Leroy R. Hill h86^, James D. MacWilliam Jr. ’54^, George Wallace Ruckert ’30^
• 1992 - Linda Bell Blackburn ’71, George Kovatch ’55, Douglas E. Yeager ’69^
• 1991 - Joseph L. Bolster Jr. ’52^, Virginia L. Corson ’74, Douglas H. Hahn ’34^
• 1990 - John H. Bitner ’38^, Sally B. Frank ’80, Martin E. Robins ’64
• 1989 - Austin M. Francis Jr. ’56, Robert H. Jiranek ’52, Hugh de N. Wynne ’39^
• 1988 - Marjorie Corman Aaron ’78, Henry R. Martin ’48^, Arthur Northwood ’35^
• 1987 - William H. Avery ’27^, William G. Bowen *58^, Milton Lyon^, Clyde E. Rankin III ’72
• 1986 - James Q. Bensen ’36^, Alison R. Bryan, Class of 1913^, Howie B. Kiser P75 h55, 75, 84^
• 1985 - Charles S. Dawson ’70, James R. Posner *70, Robert A. Winters ’35^
• 1984 - William P. Clark ’59^, John G. Kellogg ’32^, Ralph K. Ritchie ’34^
• 1983 - George R. Beetle *66, Erling Dorf h33^, John W. Kern ’49^
• 1982 - Thomas P. Birmingham ’47^, David G. Rahr ’60^, H. Coleman Tily III ’40^
• 1981 - Marvin H. Cheiten *71 h65, Frederick L. Redpath ’39^, Leslie L. Vivian Jr. ’42^
• 1980 - Harper R. Dowell ’30^, Richard L. Herbruck ’55^, Arthur C. Holden ’12^
• 1979 - Levering Cartwright, Class of 1926^, Jeremiah S. Finch h31^, Frederic E. Fox ’39^
• 1978 - George C. Denniston, Class of 1927^, William M. Hassebrock ’68, Jerry Horton ’42^
• 1977 - Arnold M. Berlin ’46, Julian T. Buxton Jr. ’50^, Robert W. Sinkler h78^
• 1976 - John C. Bogle ’51^, Gordon G. Sikes, Class of  1916^, William C. Van Siclen ’43^
• 1975 - James R. Carruthers, Class of 1925^, Alpheus T. Mason, Graduate Class of 1923^, James H. Rowbotham Jr. ’32^
• 1974 - Lucy M. Caldwell W25^, Donald P. Dickson ’49^, Howard W. Stepp h39^
• 1973 - Donald W. Griffin, Class of 1923^, Milton W. King, Class of 1912^, John H. Leh Class of 1921^, Robert B. Rinehart, Class of 1904^
• 1972 - George J. Cooke, Jr. Class of 1922^, Walter F. Hollenbach, Class of 1903, GS 1907^, Theodore E. McAlister ’52^

^ Denotes deceased alumnus/a