This is historical material, "frozen in time." The web site is no longer updated and links to external web sites and some internal pages will not work.

THE WHITE HOUSE

                      Office of the Press Secretary
                           (Santiago, Chile)
________________________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                                     April 18, 1998

                   PRESIDENT CLINTON NAMES SEVEN MEMBERS 
                       OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF
                 THE OKLAHOMA CITY NATIONAL MEMORIAL TRUST

The President today announced his intent to appoint Hannah Atkins, Luke Corbett, Donald Ferrell, Robert Johnson, Linda Lambert, Gary Marrs, and Richard Williams to the Board of Directors of the Oklahoma City National Memorial Trust. This Trust was established by an act of Congress to respectfully develop a National Memorial relation to all aspects of the April 19, 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City.

Ms. Hannah Diggs Atkins, of Oklahoma City, has an extensive background of public service. The highest ranking woman in Oklahoma state government until her retirement in 1991, Ms. Atkins served concurrently as Secretary of State and Secretary of Human Resources. She was U.S. Delegate to the 35th General Assembly of the United Nations. Inducted into both the Oklahoma Women's Hall of Fame and Oklahoma Afro-American Hall of Fame in 1983, she served six terms in the Oklahoma House of Representatives, becoming the first woman to chair a committee in that legislative body. Ms. Atkins is a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and is a graduate of the Program for Senior Executives in State and Local Government at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. She was married to the late Charles Atkins and is the mother of three children.

Mr. Luke R. Corbett, of Edmond, Oklahoma, is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Kerr-McGee Corporation. Mr. Corbett started his career with Amoco Production Company as a geophysicist and then worked for Mitchell Energy and Aminoil before joining Kerr-McGee in 1985. He was appointed its CEO in 1997. Mr. Corbett is on the Board of Directors of the American Petroleum Institute, the Domestic Petroleum Council, and is Chair of the Advisory Board of the Energy and Geoscience Institute at the University of Utah. He also serves on the boards of Devon Energy Corporation, Oklahoma Gas and Electric, the Allied Arts Foundation, the Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce, and the United Way of Metro Oklahoma City. Mr. Corbett graduated from the University of Georgia in 1969. Mr. Corbett and his wife, Beckey, have a daughter, Carrie.

Mr. Donald F. Ferrell, of Chandler, Oklahoma, is President of the Ferrell Company, a consulting, management and investment specializing in real estate. From 1953 to 1962 he worked as a reporter and editor for a number of newspapers in Oklahoma, and from 1962 to 1988 was Editor and Publisher of the Lincoln County News. He has been inducted into the Oklahoma newspaper Hall of Fame. In public service, he served for eight years in the Oklahoma State Senate, and was Senate Minority Leader from 1972 to 1974. From 1987 to 1991, Mr. Ferrell served in the Governor's Cabinet, as Secretary for Safety and Security and as Adjutant General in command of the Army and Air National Guard. He also had a distinguished career in the United States Air Force, enlisting as a private in 1946, receiving his commission through ROTC at Oklahoma State, and then progressed up through the ranks of the Oklahoma Air National Guard and the U.S. Air Force Reserve, retiring as a Major General. He received his B.S. in Journalism from Oklahoma State University. Mr. Ferrell and his wife, Sally, had three children. Their daughter, Susan Jane Farrell, was an attorney for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and was killed in the Oklahoma City bombing, April 19, 1995.

Mr. Robert M. Johnson, of Oklahoma City, is an attorney and Director of Crowe & Dunlevy, a real estate development firm. He joined Crowe and Dunlevy in 1967, became a Shareholder-Director in 1974 and has served as their President and on the Executive Committee. He is the Chair of the Oklahoma City National Memorial Foundation, appointed by the Mayor of Oklahoma City. A former member of the board of directors of the American Red Cross, Mr. Johnson currently serves on several local boards, including the Oklahoma City Arts Council, the Myriad Gardens Foundation, the Myriad Gardens Conservatory, and the Redbud Foundation. Mr. Johnson received his LLB from the University of Oklahoma. He and his wife, Gennie, have two children.

Ms. Linda Petree Lambert, of Oklahoma City, is President of LASSO, an investment corporation specializing in oil and gas development and Petree Valley Farms. Ms. Lambert has been Treasurer of the Oklahoma City National Memorial Foundation since its creation in 1995. She serves as chair, trustee, or member on numerous local boards, including Mercy Health Center, Families First 2000, the Kilpatrick Foundation and Kilpatrick Family Fund, the Oklahoma Academy, the Tulsa Opera, the Oklahoma City Community Foundation, the Oklahoma United Methodist Foundation and the International Women's Forum. She has also served as Council Member for the City of Oklahoma, and as Vice-Chair of the Board of Trustee for Oklahoma City University. Ms. Lambert has two children.

Mr. Gary Marras, of Oklahoma City, is Fire Chief of the Oklahoma City Fire Department, and had a crucial role in reacting to the Oklahoma City Bombing of April 19, 1995. As Incident Commander during this crisis, he was quickly designated the city's representative for FEMA coordination. A third generation firefighter and lifelong resident of Oklahoma City, Mr. Marrs has been in the Oklahoma City Fire Department for 26 years, and has been Fire Chief since 1992. He holds degrees in Fire Protection from Oklahoma State University and is a graduate of the Executive Fire Officer Program at the National Fire Academy.

Mr. Richard E. Williams, of Oklahoma City, was in his office on the first floor of the A.P. Murrah Federal Building when the bomb exploded on April 19, 1995. After the blast went off, Mr. Williams was buried under a pile of rubble. Severely injured and hospitalized, he spent many months recovering from his injuries. Mr. Williams began working for the U.S. General Services Administration in 1976 as a Maintenance Mechanic. He was involved with the Murrah Building directly or indirectly, from its opening in 1977, and, at the time of the blast, was Building Manager for Federal Buildings throughout Oklahoma and parts of Texas. He has been very active in the Memorial process, serving on the Board of Directors of the Oklahoma City Memorial Foundation, and co-chairing the Survivors Definition Committee and the Memorial Center Committee. A native Oklahoman, Mr. Williams attended Connors State College and East Oklahoma State University before joining the Air Force, were he served in Vietnam in 1967 to 1968. He and his wife, Lynne, have two sons.

-30-30-30-