May 2008

In Memoriam

Philip S. Amsterdam
GW alumnus and trustee emeritus Philip S. Amsterdam, B.A. ’62, died March 22. Amsterdam served as a member of the University’s Board of Trustees from 1999 to 2007. He also was a charter member of the GW Arts and Sciences Council. In 2007, the University conferred upon Amsterdam an honorary Doctor of Laws degree recognizing his decades of support and service to GW.

As a member of the GW Board of Trustees, Amsterdam served on the Alumni and Development Committee, the Investment Committee, the Executive Committee, and a special committee for the Centuries Campaign. In 2004, he established the Philip Amsterdam Graduate Teaching Assistant Award for Outstanding Teaching, which recognizes the impact of graduate students on the educational process. Amsterdam received GW’s Distinguished Alumni Service Award in 2007.

Amsterdam had a distinguished history of giving and was chairman of the Amsterdam Family Philanthropic Foundation and the Anna Amsterdam Eye Foundation. He and his wife, Gail, were longstanding supporters of GW. Their most recent gift of $5 million to the Trachtenberg Legacy Fund supports the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy and Public Administration. The Amsterdams also contributed to the University in many other ways, including a substantial gift to the Department of Anthropology, establishing the Hortense Amsterdam House on G Street.

Amsterdam was president and CEO of North Star Enterprises Inc., a private company engaged in commercial building and heavy highway contracting.

Anthony J. Mastro
Professor Emeritus Anthony J. Mastro of Potomac, Md., died March 6. Mastro was a professor of accounting and business administration at GW for more than three decades. He also served as chair of the Department of Accounting.

Mastro was an alumnus of New York University and the University of Notre Dame. He served as president of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and the National Association of Accounts and as a board member of the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. Board of Education, the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Washington Area, the Brookings Institute, and the World Bank.

David Earl Seidelson
David Earl Seidelson, Lyle T. Alverson Professor Emeritus of Law, died recently. A native of Pittsburgh, Seidelson received his bachelor’s and law degrees from the University of Pittsburgh. He served in the United States Army from 1951 to 1953. After practicing law with the firm of Rothman, Gordon & Foreman, Seidelson joined GW’s faculty as an assistant professor in 1960. He was a member of the law faculty for 38 years until his retirement in 1998. He was promoted to associate professor in 1963 and professor in 1966, and was named Lyle T. Alverson Professor of Law in 1987.

During his tenure at the Law School, Seidelson published more than 70 articles in leading law journals. In addition, Seidelson served for many years as faculty advisor to the George Washington Law Review and the Moot Court Board. He served on the Faculty Senate for three years, including one year as a member of the Faculty Senate Executive Committee and chair of the Senate Committee on Athletics and the Senate Committee on Administrative Matters as They Affect the Faculty.

Phillip D. Grub
Phillip D. Grub, M.B.A. ’60, Ph.D. ’64, Aryamehr professor emeritus of multinational management at the GW School of Business, died April 14.

Grub received bachelor’s degrees in economics and education from Eastern Washington University. He served two years in the U.S. Army, returning to teach high school. He then attended GW, earning an M.B.A. and a doctorate. Grub was the founding director of GW’s programs in international business, which later became the Department of International Business.

Grub was named the Aryamehr chair in multinational management, established by the Shah of Iran, in 1974. Grub held the endowed chair until his retirement in 1992, when he returned to his home state of Washington.

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