2006: Ed Chavez

Edmund “Ed” Chavez joined the faculty of the University of Idaho in 1951 having earned his BA in the history and a Master of Fine Arts in Theatre Arts. He met his wife, Judy and spent their school year in Moscow and their summers in Ashland, Oregon where Ed worked for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. In later years, with the successful introduction of the Summer Theatre program, Ed spent his time in Moscow year around with his family.

In 1967, Ed became the department head of Theatre Arts and in 1972 oversaw the building of the Performing Arts Center, our current Hartung Theatre. The following year, Ed and family headed to England for a sabbatical leave where he taught English Melodrama at the University of Manchester. In 1977 he won a Fulbright lectureship to teach theatre in Mexico City at the national university.

With the opening of the ASUI-Kibbie Activity Center, Ed was named Manager of the Dome, until his retirement in 1987.

Active in the Moscow community; Ed was a founding member of the Moscow Community Theatre, very involved in the planning of the Moscow Centennial Celebration. Assisting on campus, Ed was active with the UI Centennial celebration. With his expertise and skill, he was appointed to lead the complex planning of Presidential Inaugurations for Dr. Zinser and Dr. Hoover’s. Also he took on the task of “wedding planner” for Elizabeth Zinzer as she married Don Mackin in the Arboretum.

Ed and Judy, generously have shared with the University of Idaho, in establishing several scholarship funds, one in History Department and more recently a scholarship in Foreign Languages for students studying language in their native country.

Through his busy half century in Moscow, Ed has been active sharing his time with University of Idaho including major efforts with theatre arts, UIRA and the Alumni Relations Office.

Mann, Elsie 
Elsie Mann is a lifelong public servant. She and her husband Paul first came to the University of Idaho campus in 1948. But they grew up half a country block apart in the Lewiston Orchards—his family at the bottom of the hill and hers at the top on 14th Street. She was born as the fifth child of Francis Ernest and Ruth Millay in Lewiston.

Education has always been a core to the Millay and Mann families. Elsie graduated from Lewiston High School in 1937 and completed teaching courses two years later at Lewiston Normal. Elsie’s first job was to teach about 20 first and second graders at Bovill for two school years. She then returned to school, receiving a bachelor’s degree from the UI in 1943.

Paul, also a UI graduate, was an electrical engineer for Westinghouse in Wilkinsburg, PA, a suburb of Pittsburgh. The couple married in 1944.
Elsie and Paul filled the Mann household with their five children Michael, Mary Ruth, Margaret Sue, Elsie, Patrick and David.

Elsie supported higher education through the UI chapter of the American Association of University Women, UI engineering wives, and UI Home Economics Extension Club. For years they were key components of the golden era of Camp Fire Girls. She wore the red blazer and saluted with a black cane at Moscow Chamber of Commerce ribbon cutting events.

She was among a core group that established Volunteers in Moscow. Other community associations for Elsie have been support for Moscow Head Start, Latah County Historical Society, and Moscow Kiwanis.
Elsie still lives in the Mann’s original Moscow home on Walenta Drive at the entrance to University Heights. She is frequently visible at campus and city events and is a living treasure in the Moscow community.