Northern lists Founders' Excellence Award recipients

Montana State University-Northern Alumni Foundation

The Montana State University-Northern Alumni Foundation is excited to announce the 2018 Founders' Excellence Award recipients: Patricia Kinsella Holman and William Crandall. A special ceremony will be held May 4, 2018, on MSU-Northern's campus.

Patricia Holman was raised on a cattle ranch south of Havre. She graduated from Havre Central High School and enrolled at Northern to pursue an associate's degree as a legal secretary. Through her course of study at Northern she ended up graduating in 1969 with two bachelor's degrees - business education and health and physical education. From there, Holman received a master's degree in education from the University of Utah, a bachelor's degree in accounting from Boise State University in 1976, and a master's degree in business administration from the University of Montana in 1996.

Through this time, Holman was successful in a variety of careers. Her first was as an associate professor at Boise State University, where she was also the founder and coach of the gymnastics team. She was a judge at the first NCAA women's gymnastics meet, the Pacific Rim International Gymnastics Meet, and several regional and national age-group gymnastics meets.

After her time at Boise State, she and her husband owned and operated a building center in Columbus, for 12 years. They sold the store in 1992 and Holman returned to higher education as a business instructor at Montana State University-Billings.

She worked and taught in the College of Business for 19 years, receiving the College of Business Outstanding Faculty Member Award three times, the Faculty Excellence Award, and the Montana Board of Regents Emeritus Award. She became the first nontenure track adjunct faculty member in the Montana University System to be awarded the emeritus title.

After retiring from teaching in 2012, Holman became the CFO of Great Northern Drilling Company, an oil and gas investment company in Billings. She also works as controller for Walker River Construction, a heavy civil engineering company owned by her son and his wife.

Holman's community service includes work with the Billings Food Bank, Habitat for Humanity, Montana Cattlemen's Association, St. Mary's Church, R-CALF's National Scholarship Committee, the Columbus Community Foundation, Special K Ranch board and the Billings Depot board.

She is married to Tom Hinthorne, also a retired emeritus professor at MSU-Billings, and has two adult children, Aaron Holman, married to Gypsy, with son, Joe, living in Laurel; and Krista Holman Frost, married to Stacy, with daughters Madelyn, Elsie and Eva,living in Vancouver, Washington.

Holman said her greatest pleasure is spending time with her grandchildren.

William "Bill" Crandall was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and his family moved to Missoula when he was a child. He graduated from Missoula Loyola High School in 1973 and attended the University of Montana, where he received a bachelor's degree in accounting.

After graduating, he took a position with the accounting firm Ernst and Ernst in Anchorage, Alaska. From there, Crandall was hired as the controller for Pacific Western Lines, a tugboat company in Seattle.

In 1986, Crandall moved back to Missoula to work for Modern Machinery, where he has been for 32 years. Modern Machinery, owned by Dennis Washington, is a 600-employee company that sells, rents and repairs construction, mining,and forestry equipment and has 11 U.S. branches in Montana, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon as well as three branches in far eastern Russia. Crandall's current title is vice president of finance and operations.

His involvement with MSU-Northern goes back 15 years. He has served on the Diesel Program Advisory Board, including serving as the board chair. He has helped coordinate fundraisers for the Diesel Technology program, testified on behalf of Northern at the Montana Legislature, travelled with Northern recruiters on recruiting visits, sponsored and participated in the TekNoXpo and was instrumental in raising the necessary funds to build the new Diesel Technology Center.

With Crandall's help, Modern Machinery has hired Northern students as interns, in cooperative learning roles, and the company currently has about 15 Northern alumni working as full-time employees.

He is married to Janet Crandall and they have three children, Jayme, married to Brandon; Lindsay, married to Jason; and Lauren. Bill and Janet Crandall have three granddaughters: Isla, Ruby and Sylvie.

The Founders' Excellence Award presentation ceremony will be held in conjunction with MSU-Northern's Athletic Hall of Fame induction ceremony starting at 6 p.m. May 4 in the Student Union Building Ballroom on Northern's campus.

Tickets for the event are $30 per person and dinner is included.

For tickets and more information, people can contact the MSU-Northern Alumni Foundation at 265-3711.