Community & Volunteers

In the summer before their son Charles’ eighth-grade year, David and Rebecca Horner toured several boarding schools with him, but none of the schools had been a good fit.

“The last school we visited was Woodberry,” said Rebecca. “I thought he was going to be like his sister and stay in Richmond for high school.” Then came a surprise. “Somewhere, halfway on our tour, he looked up at me and said, ‘This is the one.’”

Charles’ decision fueled the subsequent arc — from young boy to young man — that he has experienced at Woodberry.

“There’s something about the place that has fed him,” said Rebecca. “It’s the people, the offerings, the faculty, the programs, the music. He now plays the organ and has taken international trips.”

“Embedded in all of these opportunities is the idea of taking risks, to learn how to be a better citizen in the world,” she continued. “Of doing the hard right instead of the easy wrong; of sharing the idea of being known, challenged, and loved; and of being a source of that to others.”

David agrees, saying Woodberry has benefited Charles enormously through “its reverence for things sacred, its affirmation of young men, and its academic rigor.” What’s more, the school fosters “a feeling of brotherhood among the boys and builds their character by teaching them to take on challenges.”

Impressed with Woodberry from the very beginning, David and Rebecca have been active volunteers for the Amici Fund since Charles was a third former and are members of the Advisory Council.

“We’re inspired by Woodberry’s mission, faculty, and leadership, by the other parents, as well as by the boys,” said David. “We want to do the work that needs doing to support the school.”

Along with the rewards of helping to advance Woodberry’s mission, the Horners treasure the friendships they have cemented with other parent volunteers.

“It’s special when you all share the same commitment to a school,” said Rebecca. “It has deepened our experience and become a real joy.”

For many years, Bob Yowell has been the lead class volunteer, reunion committee chair, and overall cheerleader for the class of 1954. He helps the class stay connected via Zoom and reaches out to every classmate before OneWoodberry and reunions. Under Bob’s leadership, the class has reached 60 percent Amici participation for ten of the last eleven years, 70 percent participation the last four years, and 80 percent participation this year for the second time ever.

Last year, Clay Morton, Whitney O’Keeffe, and Bob celebrated their class’s seventieth reunion at Woodberry. For years, Bob and classmates Joe Cooper, Al Hallum, Bill Holt, and John Smith shared an annual golf weekend. Bob also keeps up with alumni from all classes in the Durham/Chapel Hill area. He is in an investment club that includes Lucien Roughton ’68, Jack Graham ’70, and Logan Toms ’80.

As a Woodberry student, Bob was a senior monitor, member of the choir, and soccer letterman who graduated magna cum laude. After his Phi Beta Kappa education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his MD from Duke University, he served several years in the US Navy, including on a ship that was part of the blockade during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Bob spent his career as an obstetrician-gynecologist, associated with Duke Medical Center the last ten years of his career and retiring as an Emeritus Professor. Bob and his wife, Barbara, give annually to the Amici Fund and are members of the Walker Society. They are the parents of Rob Yowell ’84, Charles Yowell ’88, and Sally Yowell Barbour, who participated in the Woodberry in Britain program in 1986. Other family ties include their nephews Duke Ellington ’74 and Johns Ellington ’77.

“Woodberry’s been a major part of my life for seventy-five years, and Barbara and I have enjoyed every single aspect — reunions, class Zooms, and being Woodberry, sports camp, and Woodberry in Britain parents.”

Bob Roper ’64 has long championed his class as lead volunteer and reunion committee chair. Under the leadership of Bob and others, the class has reached 70 percent participation for five consecutive years. This year, Bob challenged his classmates to double their gifts and nine of them met his challenge, driving them to set a record for both participation, at 89 percent, and dollars contributed.

Bob co-chaired his class’s fiftieth, fifty-fifth, and sixtieth reunion committees. Despite living all over the world, the class has stayed in touch. At their sixtieth reunion, alumni from four different continents participated.

Bob also co-chaired the Campaign for the Boys, which saw alumni, parents, grandparents, and friends commit $188.2 million for tuition assistance, faculty support, and renovation of the Walker Building. He served on the board of trustees from 2005 to 2014, when he chaired the admission and marketing committee and the search committee that successfully recommended the hire of headmaster, Byron Hulsey. He received the Distinguished Service Award in 2017.

As a student, Bob was a cheerleader, monitor, and member of the chapel council and The Fir Tree editorial board. He spent his career with Philip Morris International. Upon his retirement, he returned to Virginia and established a consulting practice focused on US and Japanese business.

Bob and his wife, Kathy, have two children, Robert ’86 and Sterling. Together, Bob and Kathy give to Woodberry’s Amici Fund every year, participate in every capital campaign, and are members of the Walker Society for planned gifts.

“Outside my professional career, there is nothing I’ve done that has been more gratifying for me than my volunteer work at Woodberry,” Bob said. “These are challenging times for young men today, and I’m constantly reminded that the strong culture of the school that I experienced at Woodberry — honor, integrity, gentlemanliness, teamwork, and hard work — is all still here and strong as ever. There’s not another school anywhere that can provide a more solid foundation a young man needs today to be successful in life. Working with Byron and his team, other members of the board of trustees, and my classmates to help pay my experience at Woodberry forward has been enormously rewarding and a worthy legacy.”

In 2013, Beech Watson ’67 sent a handwritten letter to each of his classmates, telling them that their recent forty-fifth reunion had reminded him how much they and Woodberry meant to him and urging them to block off the entire month of April 2017 so he could see them at their fiftieth reunion. His classmates obliged, and they had a wonderful fiftieth reunion four years later. They continue to keep in touch through visits, phone calls, and Zoom meetings.

Beech has an exemplary Woodberry resume. As a student, he was senior prefect, sports editor of The Oracle, a member of the chapel council and the lounge committee, captain of the winter track team, and letterman for Coach Caughron’s football team.

As an alumnus, he has been the lead class volunteer and reunion committee chair for the class of 1967 for many years. Under his leadership, the class has reached 70 percent participation for eight consecutive years. Last year, they broke 80 percent participation for the first time and had one of the top percentages in the school at 87 percent. This year, they broke their record again, achieving 89 percent.

“I was fortunate to be a member of the great class of ‘67,” Beech says. “It has been an honor to serve with others in our annual campaign to support the Amici Fund as well as the Campaign for the Boys. I am so proud of my class.”

Beech spent his career in banking. He and his wife, Jean, live in Jacksonville, Florida. They give to Amici every year, participate in every capital campaign, and are members of the Walker Society.

“There is no doubt Woodberry shaped my life in so many positive and inspiring ways,” says Beech. “I attended a college to which I would never have aspired, I met friends I would never have known who further enhanced my life, I had a career which I would never have imagined, and I have a wonderful and fulfilling life. Woodberry did that for me, and I will forever be thankful.”