The tradition of awarding an Alumni Award of Merit began in 1974. That inaugural year, Evan Stubbs, V’1911, was honored for his outstanding contributions to his profession and to Penn Vet. This year, the Dean’s Alumni Council Awards Group revised the criteria a bit, placing a heightened emphasis on service to Penn Vet in addition to service to the veterinary profession.

Up to five awards will be presented annually, the group decided, typically to alumni celebrating a reunion year, but all alumni are eligible and may nominate a fellow graduate.

The following 2012 Alumni Award of Merit recipients were celebrated at this year’s Penn Annual Conference:

George Anstadt is a member of the Class of V’57, although his history of service began in 1958 when Dr. Anstadt and classmate Charlie Koenig joined the US Air Force Veterinary Corps. This was just the beginning of an impressive veterinary career that included serving as a clinical professor at Wright State University School of Medicine, spending a year in Vietnam as chief of veterinary base services and establishing the Air Force Residency Training Program in Veterinary Surgery at the USAF School of Aerospace Medicine.

Dr. Anstadt is board-certified in the American College of Veterinary Surgeons as well as the American College of Laboratory Animal Medicine, has published more than two-dozen scientific research papers and designed and developed a patented instrument for direct mechanical ventricular assistance, the “Anstadt Cup.”

Dr. Anstadt met his wife Inge while at Penn (she was the head surgical nurse at the school). His son Sven, with whom he is in practice, is also a graduate of Penn Vet, V’85. Dr. Anstadt has been a loyal supporter of scholarship at the School since 1979.

Susan Irene Jacobson is a member of the Class of V’77 and has been doing her best since graduation to keep her classmates connected to the School. She has served as a member of the VMAS executive board, is a founding member of the Dean’s Alumni Council, and typifies the model class agent. She has also been a supporter of student scholarship at the School for 28 years and participated in the “Take a Seat” campaign for Hill Pavilion.

When she is not organizing class reunions, continuing education events and class newsletters, Dr. Jacobson operates the HHD Mobile Veterinary Clinic in Virginia and devotes considerable time to local animal shelter and animal control organizations. She is an active member of the American Veterinary Medical Association, American Animal Hospital Association and the Association of House Call Practitioners.