Margaret “Peg” Horan joined the Wagner business administration faculty in 1980. Over nearly four decades, she taught and mentored accounting students, many of whom have gone on to successful careers. She advised student organizations, served on a number of College committees, directed the graduate program in accounting, and brought her knowledge to the general public through a weekly column that was published in the Staten Island Advance. She served as the faculty marshal for the 2017 commencement.
Bill Murphy began teaching art part-time at Wagner in 1984, joining the full-time faculty in 1994 while earning his MFA from Vermont College. He studied art at Brooklyn College, the School of Visual Arts, and the Art Students League. A Staten Island native, he is known for his drawings, etchings, watercolors, and paintings based on Staten Island settings or other New York City locations. His work is held in significant collections including the British Museum, the New York Public Library, the New-York Historical Society, the Library of Congress, and the Brooklyn Museum. He painted the official portrait of Norman Smith, the College’s 17th president. During the summer of 2019, he exhibited his new works in the Union Gallery.
“He was outstanding,” said David Rossiter ’95, one of Murphy’s former students. Rossiter majored in art because of Murphy’s influence, mentorship, and friendship. “We went around town and into the studio together. You saw what you were studying in the classroom being used in the real world, being applied.”
Gordon McEwan, who served as a professor and chair of the Department of Anthropology, began teaching at Wagner in 1999. He is an expert on the Incas and earlier empires in Peru, and has four decades of field experience in that country’s Valley of Cuzco. He appeared in documentary films shown on the History Channel and Discovery Channel, and was featured in National Geographic magazine. He also gave Wagner students the opportunity to gain hands-on field experience by traveling with him to Peru. He authored or co-authored six books and numerous articles about the Wari and the Incas. He earned his B.A. in anthropology from Texas A&M University and his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Texas at Austin.
“I got to spend a lot of time with [Dr. McEwan] in and out of the classroom and feel very lucky for it,” said Wagner anthropology major Rachel Zaydak ’13. She went to Peru with McEwan for two summers to assist with the excavation near Cuzco. “It was incredible to be there with him and working real time doing the things he had taught us about,” she said. (Read more about Gordon McEwan in the story “Why Anthropology Is Important.”)
Zaydak now works with the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank. “Working with Dr. McEwan and other professors, especially in the anthropology department, piqued my interest in learning about others in a fuller, immersive sense. When you learn deeply about other groups of people, you get into a lot of nuances that allow you to better understand where they are coming from and what challenges they face.”
Ian Wise joined the faculty of the Nicolais School of Business in 2014, after a successful career in the business world. He offered Wagner students the perspective that practitioners can bring to the classroom, enriching their experience at Wagner.
