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Current Issue-Fall 2008

On the cover:

Publicly ousted from the charity he began almost
30 years ago, Habitat for Humanity founder
Millard Fuller rebuilds his life and dreams,
one house at a time.

Cover design by Shannon Bryant-Hankes ’84
Photography by Jeff Etheridge

Written by Prioleau Alexander ’70
Feature design by Lizzie Moore
Artwork by Donna Racer

When former U.S. Marine Corps officer Prioleau Alexander ’70 abandoned a successful advertising job in Charleston, S.C., to perform an honest day’s work at minimum wage, he found out the simple life’s not all that simple. In this excerpt from his new book, You Want Fries with That?, Alexander tackles life as a pizza delivery guy—then tries his hand at ice cream scooping, construction cleanup and fast food, among other jobs. After all, how hard can it be?

God's Man
The rise, fall and resurrection of Millard Fuller

Written by Suzanne Johnson
Feature design by Shannon Bryant-Hankes
Photography by Jeff Etheridge

Millard Fuller stares at the ringing phone. It is shrill and insistent; he is tense and anxious—emotions foreign to his normal, high-octane exuberance. He clings to hope that the call will bring good news.

But there will be no good news today.

For nine months, the 70-year-old founder and president of Habitat for Humanity has scrambled to fend off a hostile board of directors. Accusations, denials, clandestine meetings and a touch of scandal reek of corporate politics, not a Christian housing ministry. But on this day—Jan. 31, 2005—Fuller just wants to survive until Habitat’s 200,000th house is completed in August, and then he will make a graceful exit.
He answers the phone, speaks quietly for a minute, hangs up.

Millard Fuller’s exit from Habitat will not be graceful. In fact, it’s awkward—some will say cruel.

Both he and his wife, Linda, have been fired and ordered to leave the building, taking nothing with them—even a lifetime of personal items. Locks will be changed by day’s end and, a bit later, security guards will flank Habitat’s Americus,
Ga., headquarters.

Millard Fuller is no longer welcome at the organization he dreamed up almost 29 years earlier and made a household name.

Fuller looks at Linda, fiercely loyal and still beautiful after 46 years of marriage. Tears, anger, prayers—all that will come later. Right now, walking away from Habitat for the final time, they just feel numb...

Great Inspirations
What do these 10 books have in common?
Each sparked an AU professor to respond, “Eureka!”

Feature design by Lizzie Moore
Photography by Jeff Etheridge

Sinclair Lewis was a cynic. “Our American professors like their literature clear, cold, pure and very dead,” he lectured upon winning the nation’s first Nobel Prize for Literature in 1930.

But Lewis never met Auburn University computer scientist Saad Biaz, who fell under the spell of French general and statesman Charles de Gaulle, or physics professor Edward Thomas, whose life and work were affected by his reading of the Frank Herbert science fiction classic, Dune. Other writers who have inspired Auburn faculty members include preacher Norman Vincent Peale, children’s author Watty Piper and ’70s sage Richard Bach.

Each year, the AU Libraries asks newly tenured or promoted faculty to select a book important .....

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