Honk for Ohio
Robert Rudy, BBA ’74, isn’t alarmed when drivers on I-68 honk and pull up beside him. He knows from experience it’s not road rage; they’re just reacting to his OHIO 74 license plate.

“It’s the road that everyone from Ohio takes to get to Washington, D.C., and Baltimore,” he says. “I get cars that pull up behind me beeping their horns and flashing their lights, and then they hold up OU caps or sweatshirts.”

Robert’s wife, Amy Roberts Rudy, BSHEC ’73, is an Athens native, so they often make the drive to campus from their home in Oakland, Md., where they own a ski and golf store. And now their daughter Alison is a sophomore on campus.

“I guess she’s just overwhelmed by Bobcats,” he says. No wonder: Two of Robert’s sisters are Ohio alums, as are his wife’s brother, sister, parents and grandmother.

All about compromise
When she was single, Celeste Tobias Grider, BSED ’83, had license plates that read OHIO U. But when she married, she had the feelings of a former Bowling Green State University baseball player to consider.

The solution? They bought plates for their family van that touted both schools: OU BGSU.

“Brian said we could put OU first because they were doing better in the MAC that year,” Celeste says.

The plates are out of circulation at the moment because the Franklin, Tenn., family of five sold the van. But come plate renewal time, Celeste plans to put the OU BGSU message on their new station wagon.

“It’s bad enough I had to give up the van,” she says, “but to have to give up the plate?”

Editor’s exemption
In 1998, Dave Waitkus, BSJ ’82, wanted a special plate for his new Dodge Durango. The only trick was finding the right one. He wanted something that reflected his work as a writer and editor for American Electric Power’s monthly magazine in Columbus.

“I tried variations on OU and Bobcat, but I couldn’t make anything work,” he says. “Then I came up with OU RITER.”

It’s been a little difficult for Waitkus, who benefited from the “fine tutelage” of Scripps School of Journalism professors, to live down what appears to be a misspelling on his plate. Friends love to point out his apparent error. “I usually just say, ‘Yes, I know,’ and look at the person until they realize I did it on purpose.”

Double duty
Pete Yanity, BSJ ’85, got more than a partner when he married his wife, Kelly. He also got a license plate that reads IM 4 OU. But strangely, Kelly isn’t a Bobcat.

“My wife attended Oklahoma University, so it works for both of us,” he says.

The plate is on the couple’s 1991 Ford Probe, which Pete inherited in a spousal car swap. “The car has run much better since it’s been under the Ohio banner,” he jokes.

Living in South Carolina, Pete often has to explain the plate. “Sometimes I have to say, ‘We’re not Ohio State,’” notes Pete, sports director for WSPA-TV in Spartanburg, S.C. The explanation got easier this past football season: “I get to say that we’re the ones who beat Minnesota.”

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Corinne Colbert, BSJ ’87 and MA ’93, is a freelance writer living in Amesville, Ohio.