Communication Hall of Fame
Established by the College's Board of Visitors in 1998, the Communication Hall of Fame was created to honor, preserve and perpetuate the names and accomplishments of distinguished individuals who have brought lasting fame to the state of Alabama.
The College maintains permanent archives for the collection of memorabilia related to the lives and careers of individuals inducted into the Communication Hall of Fame.
2009 Inductees
Winston F. Groom Jr.
Winston Groom attended The University of Alabama and, while studying literature and writing for campus publications such as the Rammer-Jammer, decided to become a writer. First, however, he served in Vietnam in the U.S. Army during 1966 and 1967. After his discharge, Groom became a journalist, working as a reporter and columnist for the Washington Star, and then in 1976, with the encouragement of Willie Morris and other literary friends, he became a full-time writer of novels.
Much of Groom’s work has to do, in whole or in part, with Vietnam and the military. He and Duncan Spenser published the nonfiction “Conversations with the Enemy,” the story of Pfc. Robert Garwood. The book was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.
Norma Saliba Hanson
Norma Hanson credits her father, Joseph Saliba Sr., for shaping her work ethic and her values. “He considered having a job a gift,” Hanson says. As she was headed from her hometown of Dothan to The University of Alabama, her father gave her the following advice: “No one there is any better than you are, and no one there is beneath you . . . so look everyone in the eye and treat everyone the same.”
After graduation in 1957, Hanson took her values and her energy into her chosen field of marketing and advertising, and the results, over a career of more than 50 years, have been amazing. Hanson went to work for Tucker Wayne & Co. in Atlanta in 1980, worked for Design Associates as a consultant, and then became the co-founder of Slaughter-Hanson in Dothan and Birmingham, working as lead account manager on many important national accounts.
Raymond D. Hurlbert (1902 – 1996)
Raymond Hurlbert, born in Pittsburgh, Penn., grew up in Birmingham and spent his professional life in the service of education and communication – in many spheres – dedicated to his beloved Alabama.
Hurlbert earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Birmingham-Southern College. In 1924 he began his education career as a teacher, and he was promoted within two years to principal in the Birmingham city schools. From the beginning, Hurlbert, as an educator, was a natural communicator. He was rapidly recognized as a leader, elected president of the Birmingham Teachers Association, the Alabama Principals Association and was appointed public relations director for the city board of education.
S. Vincent Townsend Sr. (1901 – 1978)
Vincent Townsend, former Birmingham News executive editor and assistant to the publisher, was a journalist during some of the most newsworthy years of the last century, in one of the most newsworthy cities. During the turbulent years of the civil rights movement, Townsend worked tirelessly behind the scenes to promote better interracial relations and was in touch with city, state and national figures, who consulted him for advice.
Jesse Lewis Sr., who founded the Birmingham Times in 1964 to better serve the city’s black community, recalled, in a 2009 interview, getting to know Townsend in the 1960s: “He guided me along the way during the Civil Rights struggle. He was a central figure behind the formation of the Downtown Action Committee, and he was responsible for going to the merchants and telling them they had to let black people drink out of the fountains, use the bathrooms, ride the elevators and try on clothes. During the heat of the [Civil Rights] movement, we often talked two or three times a day. He was not the type of person that did anything openly, for recognition or publicity, he just did it out of the goodness of his heart.