KNOXVILLE, Tenn.–The Fred M. Roddy Foundation is continuing its support of the University of Tennessee-Knoxville scholarship program bearing the name of the Blount County native.
The Roddy board of directors Thursday gave UT a $50,000 check, bringing to $125,000 this year’s total. Since the scholarship program was established in 1971, the foundation has given approximately $3.5 million to the fund and more than 4,200 scholarships have been awarded.
Foundation representatives Lee A. Kintzel and her husband, Roger, of Atlanta, and Peter Arnold and his wife, Sandy, from Charlestown, R.I., are on campus this weekend.
Roger Kintzel is the publisher of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and was UT-Knoxville’s commencement speaker in August.
“His (Fred Roddy’s) generosity means that he was a true Tennessee Volunteer,” said Leslie Logan, a senior in the college scholars program and a Roddy Merit Scholar, who addressed the group on behalf of the Roddy Scholars.
“‘Thank you’ is insufficient, because he gave so much to all of us,” Logan, a native of Alcoa, who plans to attend law school following her May graduation, said.
Lee Kintzel told the scholars, “The best thing that can happen is that the beneficiaries of the scholarship will remember Mr. Roddy’s generosity and look back 20 years from now and do the same.”
UT-Knoxville Chancellor William T. Snyder and Vice-President Emeritus Charles F. Brakebill also spoke. Linda Davidson, UT-Knoxville vice chancellor for alumni affairs and development, presided.
Roddy, a mechanical engineer, graduated from UT in 1927. He invented a machine for handling plastics and founded Cumberland Engineering Co. in Kingsport in 1939. The company, now located in Attleboro, Mass., remains a large supplier of machinery for plastics manufacturing.
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