Editor & Contributing Author for The North Carolina Atlas and this website

Dr. Alfred W. Stuart

Al Stuart serves as the editor of the NCAtlasrevisited website and the author of its chapters on Population, Manufacturing, Religion, and Trade-Banking-Tourism. A native of Roanoke, VA, he attended the Virginia Military Institute and holds degrees from the University of South Carolina (BS), Emory University (MS), and The Ohio State University (PhD). In the 1950s Al worked in Polar research in Greenland and Antarctica. Mt. Stuart, a 6,549 feet peak in Victoria Land, Antarctica, was named for him in recognition of his work there. A growing interest in economic and population change in the South led him to pursue a career in economic geography. After completing doctoral studies at Ohio State, he joined the faculty of the University of Tennessee. In 1969 he came to UNC Charlotte and served as the chair of the Department of Geography& Earth Sciences for 18 years. He retired in 1999 but continues his research on North Carolina as a Professor Emeritus of Geography.

In addition to the current North Carolina Atlas (UNC Press, 2000), Al and Dr. Doug Orr, President of Warren Wilson College and former Vice Chancellor at UNC Charlotte, have collaborated as editors and authors on a number of books, including The Metrolina Atlas (UNC Press, 1972), The North Carolina Atlas: Portrait of a Changing Southern State, (UNC Press, 1975), and The Land of the South (Oxmoor House, 1989).

CoAuthor, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Public Education Chapter

Dr. James E. Lyons

Dr. James E. Lyons is Professor of Educational Leadership in the Department of Educational Leadership at The University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He joined the UNC-Charlotte faculty in 1979, and served as Department Chairperson for fifteen years. He has taught and mentored numerous masters and doctoral students in educational leadership programs who now hold middle and senior level educational leadership positions. Previously, he served as a high school teacher, assistant principal, principal, and school management consultant with the Ohio Department of Education. His research interests include educational policy studies, human resources, organizational development, and school leadership. During the last 25 years, he has published more than thirty-five articles and book chapters, presented research findings at national and international conferences, and served as a consultant to numerous colleges and universities, state education agencies, local school districts and several hundred schools. Professor Lyons earned the PhD at The Ohio State University. In 2005, Jim was selected to receive the Faculty Service Award by the UNC Charlotte Alumni Association.

CoAuthor, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Public Education Chapter

Dr. Mary Lynne Calhoun

Dr. Mary Lynne Calhoun serves as Dean of the College of Education at UNC Charlotte where over 3000 students are preparing for education careers at the undergraduate and graduate levels.   A member of the faculty since 1982, she was named Dean of the College in 2000.   Innovative programs in the College of Education include new initiatives to prepare second-career professionals for teaching careers and doctoral programs in educational leadership, counseling, special education, and curriculum & instruction.

A native of Huntington, WV, Dr. Calhoun was educated at Randolph-Macon Woman's College in Virginia and received the M.Ed. and Ph.D. degrees in special education from the University of Georgia.   Her research focuses on early intervention to support the development of children with disabilities. She is the author of four books and over fifty articles in her field of special education and has received numerous research grants from the U.S. Department of Education.   She began her career as a classroom teacher and has taught children with special needs in Ohio, Michigan, Georgia, and South Carolina.   Professional service includes membership on the North Carolina Principal Fellows Commission, the State Board of Education's Select Committee on Lateral Entry, and the Executive Committee of the West Mecklenburg Collaborating for Educational Reform Initiative.

Author, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Agriculture Chapter

Dr. Thomas E. Ross

Thomas E. Ross is Professor of Geography at The University of North Carolina at Pembroke. A native of West Virginia, he has lived and studied in North Carolina since 1969. He earned his undergraduate and Master’s degree in geography from Marshall University, and his Ph. D. in Geography from The University of Tennessee. Ross has published about a dozen books, including American Indians in North Carolina, An Annotated Bibliography of Carolina Bays, and American Indians: A Cultural Geography. He was a contributing author of The North Carolina Atlas.

Author, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Health & Health Care Chapter

Dr. Gerald F. Pyle

Dr. Pyle is a medical geographer cross-trained in epidemiology. A member of the UNC Charlotte faculty for 25 years, his degrees are from Kent State University (B.A.) and the University of Chicago (A.M., and Ph.D.). He has authored or co-authored seven books and dozens of professional journal articles in the areas of medical geography and epidemiology, including The North Carolina Atlas. Currently a retired member of the UNC Charlotte Department of Health Behavior and Administration, he also spent 16 years in the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences.

Author, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Air Quality Chapter

Dr. Walter Martin

Dr. Martin is an associate professor of geography and earth sciences at UNC Charlotte. He received a B.S. degree in geography and earth science and an M.A. degree in geography from East Carolina University, and a Ph.D. in geography from the University of Tennessee. His research and teaching have centered on various aspects of the interaction between human activity and environmental processes with particular emphasis on resources and environmental quality in urban regions. In addition to teaching introductory earth science and physical geography, he also teaches courses in environmental management, applied climatology, and urban air quality. He has published serveral scientific papers dealing with applied aspects of meteorology and climatology, coastal zone management, urban and regional air quality, and transportation planning. He has also authored/coauthored several books including the "Air Quality" Chapter in The North Carolina Atlas.

Author, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Politics & Goverment Chapter

Dr. Schley R. Lyons

Schley R. Lyons recently retired as Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and was the former chair of the Political Science Department at UNC Charlotte. He joined the UNC Charlotte faculty in 1969. He completed his undergraduate work at Shepherd College before earning his PhD. from American University in Washington, DC. Lyons’ research areas are state and local politics and American Electoral Behavior. He authored the Politics and Government chapter in The North Carolina Atlas.

Author, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Weather & Climate Chapter

Peter J. Robinson

Peter Robinson is a native of Great Britain. He received his Bachelors and Masters Degrees in Geography from the University of London and a Doctorate from McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. They were all in the field of Geography, with a specialization in Climatology. He moved to North Carolina from Canada in 1971 and has been a professor of Geography at UNC Chapel Hill since then. After a spell as North Carolina’s State Climatologist, he moved to the Washington DC area for over two years as the Associate Director of the National Climate Program Office. Since then he has served on various panels of the National Academy of Sciences and several federal agencies, including the National Science Foundation and the Environmental Protection Agency. His research has centered on the application of climate information to societal problems, particularly the potential impact of climate variability on energy and water resources. In addition to authoring the Weather & Climate section in The North Carolina Atlas, he has published one book and over 50 articles in major meteorological and geographical journals, and is Editor of Meteorological Applications", a journal of the (U.K.) Royal Meteorological Society. His newest book, North Carolina Weather and Climate, UNC Press, 2005, with a foreword by Greg Fishel, is now available, $39.95 cloth, $24.95 paper. Visit the UNC Press Web to learn more about the book and to obtain a copy.

Author, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Economy Chapter

Dr. William Graves

Dr. Graves is an assistant professor of economic geography and John H. Biggs faculty fellow at UNC Charlotte. He received B.A. degrees in Physics and Geography from UNC Chapel Hill and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Geography from the University of Georgia. His research and teaching have centered on the interactions between corporate finance and urban geography with particular emphasis on the economic geography of the South. In addition to teaching introductory courses in economic geography and the geography of North Carolina, he also teaches courses in business applications of geographic information systems, the geography of knowledge and information and site feasibility analysis.

Author, North Carolina Atlas Revisited History Chapter

Dr. David Goldfield

David Goldfield is the Robert Lee Bailey Professor of History at UNC Charlotte. His recent publications include Southern Histories: Public, Personal, and Sacred. University of Georgia Press, 2003, and Still Fighting the Civil War: The American South and Southern History. LSU Press, 2002. Dr Goldfield earned his PhD. from the University of Maryland in 1970.

CoAuthor, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Land Regions Chapter

Dr. John Diemer

John Diemer is Professor of Earth Sciences at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte where he has been on the faculty since 1988. Raised in Illinois, he received his bachelor’s degree in geology at Oberlin College in 1977 and his MS (1979) and PhD (1985) degrees in geology from Binghamton University. Diemer is a sedimentary geologist and his geologic research focuses on interpreting the sedimentary record of clastic depositional environments, basin analysis, the influence of tectonics on sedimentation, and in addressing applied environmental problems such as sedimentation in lakes and streams caused by urbanization. His sedimentological work has resulted in more than twenty refereed publications and fifty conference presentations.

In addition, Diemer has an active research program in the history of geology where he concentrates on the geologic work of Roderick Murchison in Scotland, Russia and Scandinavia. That research program has resulted in numerous publications, including a book that was published by the British Geological Survey in 2004, entitled Murchison’s Wanderings in Russia, prepared in collaboration with Michael Collie.

CoAuthor, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Land Regions Chapter

Dr. Andy Bobyarchick

Andy Bobyarchick is an Associate Professor of Earth Sciences at UNC Charlotte. He received a B.S. Degree in Geology from Birmingham-Southern College, an M.S. Degree in Geological Sciences from Virginia Tech, and a Ph.D. From Albany State University. Dr. Bobyarchick also worked for the U.S. Geological Survey for several years. His research specialties are structural geology and tectonics particularly of the Southern Appalachian Mountains. The courses he teaches at UNC Charlotte in addition to those of his primary research fields include introductory physical geology, geophysics, geologic mapping, and geodynamics. He has introduced many K-12 teachers in the greater Charlotte region to the delights of field geology through intensive summer workshops. Dr. Bobyarchick is also an enthusiastic innovator of technology in the classroom and an avid student of the uses and abuses of earth sciences in theatrical films.

CoAuthors, North Carolina Atlas Revisited Transportation Chapter

Dr. Edd Hauser

Edd Hauser is Director of the UNC Charlotte Center for Transportation Policy Studies, a position he has held since September 2000. Edd has a PhD in Transportation Engineering from North Carolina State University, and a Masters Degree in Regional Planning from UNC Chapel Hill. He also attended graduate school at Northwestern University, where his area of concentration was in transportation systems.

He has held academic appointments over approximately half of his career at Duke University, North Carolina State University, and Arizona State University, in addition to his current position at UNC Charlotte. At North Carolina State, he was director of ITRE, the North Carolina Institute for Transportation Research and Education. Edd's experience has focused primarily on public sector transportation programs, including teaching, research, planning, systems analysis, economic assessment, and program management. Edd can be reached by phone at 704.687.3997 or by email at ehauser@email.uncc.edu

Sherry Elmes

Ms. Elmes is Associate Director with the Center for Transportation Policy Studies at UNC Charlotte and came to the University from her position as Vice President of Touch Information, Inc. in Chattanooga, TN. Through a history of working with North Carolina state government for over a decade and Tennessee state government for almost two decades, she understands and applies current policies and procedures of both state and local governments that affect transportation policies. She received her degree in Education from Auburn University. Ms. Elmes can be reached by phone at 704.687.4653 or by email at smelmes@email.uncc.edu

Dennis Rash

Mr. Rash is Executive in Residence with the Center for Transportation Policy Studies at UNC Charlotte and came to the University from his position as Senior Vice President for Corporate Real Estate Services of the Bank of America. He also recently completed a term as a Member of the North Carolina State Board of Transportation. He received his Law Degree from the University of Virginia after graduating from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He was in private practice for five years before a career as a university administrator and senior bank executive.

Nicholas Swartz

Nicholas is currently entering his third year as a doctoral student in Public Policy at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science and his Master’s Degree in Public Administration from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. He currently works as a research assistant with the Center for Transportation Policy Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

Patrick L. Jones

Graphics Artist

Patrick is a native of Pleasant Garden, NC. He is a graduate of Appalachian State University, Class of 2002.

He holds a B.S. in Geography with a concentration in Geographic Information Systems (GIS), and a minor in sociology. His interests include cartography and the connection people have with the area they live in. Patrick is currently serving as Staff Cartographer for the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences at UNC Charlotte.

Michael C. Teague

Webmaster/Webdesigner

Michael is a native of Asheboro, NC, and a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Class of 2002.

He holds a B.S.B.A in Management Information Systems, and a minor in Religous Studies. Michael is pursuing a career in Information Technology, and is interested in working for the government. He currently serves as the Computer Systems Administrator for the Student Association at UNC Charlotte.

Gary M. Addington

Web Consultant

Gary is a native of Dallas, NC. He holds a B.A. in Geography from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte '75.

Gary currently serves as the Computer Systems & Networking Administrator for the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences at UNC Charlotte. Other duties within the dept. include Photographer/Darkroom Specialist, Asset Management, Cartography and Graphic Design.