People
Collection for person entities.
Pages
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- Kylie Howard
- A volunteer with the Mesa County Oral History Project.
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- L. Luis Lopez
- L. Luis López is a professor emeritus from Colorado Mesa University. He was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on March 15, 1938. One of six children, five boys, and one girl, López went to Eugene Field public school in New Mexico. After graduation from high school, he joined The Society of Jesus with the intention of becoming a priest. While under the Jesuits, he went to Spring Hill College and received his BA in Secondary Education before eventually leaving the order. He taught high school and coached baseball for a few years and became involved in civil rights activism. He applied to study at St. Johns College in Santa Fe, where he graduated with his MA in Liberal Arts. He was granted a fellowship studying Lyric Poetry under Dr. Helen Hennessy Vendler at Harvard University, and another studying Innocent Suffering with Dr. Terrence Tilley at St. Michael’s College. For a short time, he sold insurance before deciding to “get to the top of something.” He again taught high school and then concurrently began studying at the University of New Mexico for his Ph.D., focusing on Middle English and Anglo-Saxon Literature. This brought him to research dream poetry at Oxford for two years. He then taught as a professor at the University of New Mexico. Retiring early at 52, he was persuaded to come to Grand Junction, Colorado and to teach Latin at Grand Junction High School. He soon after taught Latin and Greek studies at Mesa State College (now Colorado Mesa University), and served as Director of the Academic Honors Program. For many years he led the poetry group at Mesa County Libraries, which connected him to many poets local to the area. López has published five books: Musings of a Barrio Sack Boy, A Painting of Sand, Andromeda to Vulpecula: 88 Constellation Poem, the American Book Award prize-winner Each Month I Sing, and More Musings of a Barrio Sack Boy. He also wrote the play Día de Visitaciones, which was produced under the direction of Jose G. Garcia, and has been involved in many readings and cultural activities.