Fear the Turtle Lands in a Big Way

THE UNIVERSITY’S SUCCESSFUL marketing campaign, which captured a national Grand Gold Medal by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education this past July, is now showing up in even bigger ways in the region.

At the state’s largest airport, Baltimore-Washington International (BWI), patrons can’t miss prominent Fear the Turtle back lit ads on walls throughout the concourses and an even larger wall wrap by the public escalators in Concourse B. The airport presence began in November and will continue throughout 2005.

“Maryland’s airport and Maryland’s university seemed like a natural connection,” says Deborah Wiltrout, director of university marketing. Nearly 50,000 people pass through BWI each day.

In addition to the ads, fellow Terps will be able to spot their luggage easily if it sports a large Fear the Turtle tag. The tags will be distributed at upcoming university events.

Fear the Turtle coasters will appear at airport watering holes in time for the ACC Tournament that will be held at the MCI Center—the first time in Washington since 1987.

For those not flying off, look for the familiar Fear the Turtle smashing through a Pepsi logo on the backs of Pepsi delivery trucks throughout the Baltimore/Washington/Northern Virginia region. Pepsi is the university’s preferred vendor on campus.

Says Wiltrout of this multi-pronged approach: “It’s about picking opportunities that have a local, regional and national presence and getting the most for our advertising dollars.”

And if you’re wondering where the fearless Terp will show up next, stay tuned for the university’s public service announcement that airs on nationally televised men’s basketball games, at Comcast Center and on the university’s home page. Let’s just say it’s “out of this world.” —DB

Raise Your Hands for Scholarships

The popular rubbery wrist bands are championing a new cause. A total of 50,000 “Fear the Turtle” bands (black and red versions) will be sold on campus at the Comcast Center, Barnes & Noble and other venues and through regional retailers. All proceeds will benefit the university’s $200 million scholarship campaign, co-chaired by Gary Williams ’68, men’s head basketball coach. (Read more about the effort in the story on Williams.)

That Which Is Old Is New Again

It was 1969, the year of the Apollo moon shot. David C. Driskell, then professor and art department chair at Fisk University in Nashville, created a number of exquisite woodcuts. He set them aside, and they were never printed.

Only a conversation in February 2004 between Driskell, a professor at Maryland for the past 27 years, and Robert Steele, director of the university’s David C. Driskell Center, rescued them.

Steele believed that the center should launch its own series of special-edition prints. The proceeds would support the center’s mission—to explore the cultural dimensions of the African Diaspora.

Alumni and friends can look forward to a new print each year, the work chosen in coordination with the center’s director, assistant director for visual arts and a visual arts committee. Painter, sculptor and long-time Driskell colleague, Faith Ringgold, will supply the 2005 print from her new Jazz Series. —MW

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