Eugart Yerian Award winners
The Ostrander’s Premier Award Is Presented in Recognition of An Individual’s Distinguished Lifetime/Career As Demonstrated By Outstanding, Significant, Valuable and Lasting Service, Support and Active Participation in a Variety of the Many Areas and Aspects of Community Theatre Within Our Greater Memphis Theatre World.
Given at the first awards in 1984, this special award for "service to Memphis theater that spans generations" went to Eugart Yerian, director of the Memphis Little Theatre from 1929 to 1961. (The following year, the award itself was named the Eugart Yerian Award.)
Named after Eugart Yerian, an aesthete and adventurer who served as the director of Memphis Little Theatre (now Theatre Memphis), for 21+ years. Recruited to Memphis from the Pasadena Playhouse, Yerian helmed the company from 1932-1939 and again from 1947-1961, on either side of WWII. He began the tradition of mounting ambitious shows that had been popular on Broadway just a season or two earlier.
Yerian also founded the “Soaring Club,” the first gliding club in the Southeast. He was a member of the SSA Board and Editor of Soaring magazine. In 1967, when mountain "wave riding" was being pioneered, he became one of the first 100 glider pilots to reach 30,000- feet in altitude during a flight over Pike's Peak in Colorado.
Given at the first awards in 1984, this special award for "service to Memphis theater that spans generations" went to Eugart Yerian, director of the Memphis Little Theatre from 1929 to 1961. (The following year, the award itself was named the Eugart Yerian Award.)
Named after Eugart Yerian, an aesthete and adventurer who served as the director of Memphis Little Theatre (now Theatre Memphis), for 21+ years. Recruited to Memphis from the Pasadena Playhouse, Yerian helmed the company from 1932-1939 and again from 1947-1961, on either side of WWII. He began the tradition of mounting ambitious shows that had been popular on Broadway just a season or two earlier.
Yerian also founded the “Soaring Club,” the first gliding club in the Southeast. He was a member of the SSA Board and Editor of Soaring magazine. In 1967, when mountain "wave riding" was being pioneered, he became one of the first 100 glider pilots to reach 30,000- feet in altitude during a flight over Pike's Peak in Colorado.
1984- Eugart Yerian
1985 – Jackie Nichols
1986 – Ray Hill
1987 – Sherwood Lohrey
1988 – Gene Crain
1989 – Lucile Doan Ewing
1990 – Alice Rogers
1991 – Buck Clark
1992 – Betty May Collins Parker
1993 – Bennet Wood
1994 – Gene Katz
1995 – Walter Armstrong
1996 – Keith Kennedy
1997 – Barry Fuller
1998 – Jim Ostrander
1999 – Tony Lee Garner (posthumously)
2000 – Jo Malin
2001 – Andre Bruce Ward
2002 – Jerry Chipman
2003 – Dorothy Blackwood
2004 – Marler Stone
2005 – Ken Zimmerman
2006 – Bill Short
2007 – Julia “Cookie” Ewing
2008 – Dorothy O. Kirsch
2009 – Josie Helming
2010 – Otis Smith
2011 – Ron Gephart
2012 – Ann Sharp & Jude Knight
2013 – Gloria Baxter
2014 – John Rone
2015 – Karen Barile
2016 – Jim & JoLynne Palmer
2017 – Irene Crist
2018- Tony F. Isbell
2019- Christina Wellford Scott
2020- Ann Marie Hall
2021- Andy Saunders
