FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: APRIL 25,
2003
TRUSTEES TO HONOR FRANKIE BELLORA
For the first time in the history of North Arkansas College, an employee will
receive the Board of Trustees Award in 2003. Frankie Bellora, administrative
assistant to the president, is being honored for her 29 years of service to
Northark. Laretta Moore, chairman of the North Arkansas College Board of
Trustees, will present the award Saturday, May 10, at 10 a.m. in the Bill Baker
Amphitheatre during Northark's Commencement exercises.
A graduate of Harrison High School and what is now the University of Central Arkansas, Frankie worked with her parents, Benita and the late Joe F. Keeling, who owned and operated Home School Supply in Harrison, for 10 years after finishing college. Frankie and her sister, Tricia Turner, were always closely associated with education. Their parents taught in area schools before establishing Home School Supply, which did business with schools all over Arkansas. Frankie likes to say that she used to know all of the zip codes in the state from preparing shipping labels.
After her parents sold their business and retired, Frankie started work at Northark in June of 1974. Her first job was in the Community Services and Continuing Education Office. She assisted the late Calvin "Lefty" Burks, who was instrumental in starting the off-campus programs that led to the creation of ASU-Mountain Home and Northwest Arkansas Community College.
During her second year at the college, Frankie moved to the president's office. She worked with Dr. Bill Baker, Northark's founding president, from 1975 until his retirement in 2001. For the past two years, she has worked with Dr. Jeff Olson. In her job, Frankie has also played a special role in assisting members of the North Arkansas College Board of Trustees.
"When one stops and realizes that almost half of one's life has been spent working with the best people in the world and, in a small way, helping shape lives of students interested in improving themselves, it's rewarding and sobering!" Frankie says.
Frankie and her late husband, Val R. Bellora, were married in 1983. On her wedding day, as she likes to say, "in the blink of an eye" she had 10 stepchildren: Robert Bellora of Webster Groves, Mo.; Kathleen Bellora Clark of Effingham, Ill.; Joe Bellora of Wichita, Kan.; Ken Bellora of Plymouth, Ind.; Roseanne Bellora Davis of Amite, La.; Mary Bellora Davidson of Alexandria, Va.; John Bellora of San Diego, Calif.; James Bellora of Falls Church, Va.; Val Bellora of Holland, Mich.; and Tony Bellora of La Jolla, Calif. She also has 17 grandchildren who refer to Frankie as "Granny V."
Val and Frankie emphasized the importance of higher education, and the Bellora children have earned 14 college diplomas, including associate, bachelor's and master's degrees. Following Val's death in 2001, Frankie and members of her family and friends established the Val R. Bellora Memorial Scholarship at North Arkansas College through an endowment gift to the North Arkansas College Foundation, Inc.
After almost three decades of dedicated service to the college and its students, trustees and presidents, Frankie Bellora is looking forward to traveling and spending time with her family.
"Life is short, and while I can, I want
to travel and visit Val's kids and grandkids, spend time with my sister and our
88-year-old mother, and make time to smell the roses along the way!" Frankie
says.