Hard working, energetic, dedicated, fair-minded, community-spirited - all good adjectives, but barely adequate to describe Baldwin Wallace University Alumni Athletic Association Hall of Famer Eloise Schaefer Tressel '72. She has set a record for action in the public good which will long be remembered by the many whose lives she has touched. 

Eloise was born in Cleveland, but was educated in Ada, Ohio, where she was a classmate of a young man named Lee Tressel, who later became her husband. She attended Ohio State University and received an RN degree from St. Luke's School of Nursing. After helping husband Lee receive his doctorate and their three sons, Dick, Dave and Jim their undergraduate degrees, Eloise went back to school to earn her BA at BW in 1972. 

After the Tressels came to Berea in 1958, Eloise quickly became involved in activities which related to just about every facet of life in Berea. She has served as PTA President, Berea High School Boosters Club President, active member of A.F.S., Chairperson of the Berea Health Fund, President of the BW Women's Club, President of the Faculty Women's Club, an early volunteer for the Berea chapter of FISH, a board member of the Berea United Church of Christ and a member of the Advisory Committee to the Berea Board of Education, Berea Historical Society and Alpha Phi service sorority, and as a member of the board of the Cleveland chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. 

All the while, she never missed a game of husband-coach Lee's BW football teams in the 23 years before his death in 1980. Eloise became a sort of unofficial "team mother" to the football team, even starting to sew players' names on their jerseys in 1974, a volunteer activity which she has headed ever since. She later became known as the matriarch of Ohio College football by many who knew her passion for the game, but more importantly her passion for BW students and BW student-athletes who played football.

Eloise also served as an Administrative Assistant in Education at BW for many years. Her interest in BW sports and the young athletes who play them resulted in another very special project - the development of the athletic archives for the college. Housed originally in the Watts Athletic Center on the campus and now in the Lou Higgins Center, the archives contain many of Lee's mementos and trophies, lovingly added by Eloise. In addition, Eloise and her dedicated and passionate group of volunteers turned the BW Athletic Archives into one of the best at any college or university, large or small, in the nation.

Unstinting volunteer, humanitarian and civil servant are words that come to mind loud and clear when one thinks of Eloise Tressel. Fortunately for Berea, her own actions have spoken the loudest of all.