Contact: David West (west@nsula.edu )
News Bureau
Northwestern State University
Natchitoches, LA 71497
(318) 357-6466

10/07/2002

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NATCHITOCHES-The College of Business at Northwestern State University will sponsor the 36th Annual J. Walter Porter Forum Wednesday Oct. 16 in Russell Hall. The topic of the forum is "Natural Resources Mean Business."

Speakers for the forum will be Carl Gunter, plant manager of Weyerhaeuser's Red River containerboard mill in Campti, Iris Harper, executive director of the Natchitoches Convention and Tourist Bureau, John B. Selman, president of Cobra Oil and Gas LLC and Woodlands Energy Corp. and Danny Vance, general manager of the Trinity River Authority.

Sellman will speak at 10 a.m. in the David Morgan Auditorium (Room 107) followed by Vance at 11 a.m. Harper will speak at 10 a.m. in Room 213 followed by Gunter.

Gunter has worked in the paper industry throughout the U.S. for 20 years. He joined Willamette Industries in 1995 at the Red River mill in Campti. Gunter has been the facility's maintenance manager, paper mill superintendent and production manager.

A graduate of Buckeye High School and Louisiana Tech, Gunter is a Natchitoches resident. He is active in church and community activities.

Harper has been executive director of the Natchitoches Convention and Tourist Bureau since 1998. Before joining the Convention and Tourist Bureau, Harper was station manager for KNOC-AM/KDBH-FM in Natchitoches.

Harper has been involved in professional and community activities in both Shreveport and Natchitoches. She was a member of the Shreveport-Bossier Advertising Federation Board of Directors. Harper was also a member of the committee that began the Natchitoches Jazz/R&B Festival, serving as chairperson for the event in 1997 and 1998.

Selman has been president of Cobra Oil and Gas LLC and Woodlands Energy Corp. for two years, working to acquire minerals and royalties and exploration along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast. A graduate of the University of Alabama, Selman worked as an investment advisor/broker for Morgan Keegan & Co. in New Orleans. He has also been involved in securing oil and gas leases, acquisitions and right of way management.

Vance earned both a bachelor's and master's degree at Sam Houston State University. He served in the U.S. Army in Europe. Vance served as general services manager and assistant regional manager before being named general manager of the Trinity Valley Authority. He also serves on the Region C Water Planning Group which includes Dallas and Tarrant Counties along with 14 other Texas counties.

The J. Walter Porter Forum is sponsored by the College of Business and made
possible by the endowment established by the family and friends of the late J. Walter Porter in recognition of his interest in improving the image of business as a career field for college students and of his concern for moral and ethical standards as expressed in his philosophy of business. The forum is an effort to translate the textbook into practice by bringing capable, successful business executives to the campus to speak on selected topics in their area of expertise.

Porter was a native of Kaufman County, Texas. He graduated from Texas A&M and earned a Master's in Civil Engineering from Harvard. In 1931, he helped organize the Gifford-Hill Pipe Company at Grand Prairie, Texas. Porter saw the need to sell business to the college and to bridge the gap between the college campus and industry. He felt many people in the academic, professional, governmental and even in the business world, fail to understand the workings of the competitive system and the motivating force behind it.

Porter was determined to contribute to a better understanding of that system among his own employees, associates, and, where he could, on college campuses. His death came on the eve of a scheduled three-day lecture program at Southwestern College in Winfield, Kan. The J. Walter Porter Forum is a continuation of that effort.

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