Rozetta Hallcock ’65 is shown as a chemist going through clothes from a crime scene. This is when she served the Johnson County Sheriff’s Office.

A generous supporter of the growing archery team at Buena Vista University is Rozetta Hallcock ’65, a graduate who didn’t participate in archery during her time as an undergraduate. For good reason: Archery wasn’t offered as a sport in the 1960s at BVU. It’s only become a sanctioned – and popular – team sport in recent years.

The fact that Hallcock supports a program that’s seen as a pioneer draws a parallel to this donor. She, too, was a pioneer at Buena Vista some six decades ago.

A chemistry major, Hallcock completed an internship with the Atomic Energy Commission in 1964. Upon her graduation (cum laude honors), she was offered a job with the commission, which she gratefully accepted. She would remain there and serve our country in that capacity for the ensuing four years.

“I was the only woman at the time working in the divisions or in the research related to plutonium and uranium,” she remembers.

When cuts to the federal program were about to be made, Hallcock reached out to Charles Brauer, Professor of Chemistry, at Buena Vista. She asked if he might serve as a reference. He took an additional step and directed Hallcock to apply for a position with the Missouri State Patrol. She quickly earned a position in forensics at the Missouri State Crime Lab.

Following a two-year stint in Missouri, Hallcock joined the State of Iowa Department of Criminal Investigation in establishing the state crime lab in Des Moines. She would ultimately do the same in Olathe, Kan., serving Johnson County.

“I kept my evidence from crime scenes in a jail cell,” she says with a laugh.

In 1978, Rozetta and husband George settled on a farm near Northfield, Minn. Together, she and George raised three children in addition to 600 Holstein steer per year. She served 26 years with the Dakota (Minn.) County Farm Bureau, including 15 years as President.

Beyond her work in the classroom and laboratories (and on Buena Vista’s competition chess team), Rozetta Hallcock remembers an educational experience that grew out of a Student Christian Fellowship experience. She joined fellow students in traveling to a Native American reservation in Nebraska. Once there, Buena Vista students worked with children who had been removed from their home as alcoholism and poverty afflicted a number of homes on the reservation.

“I remember a student who sent me a thank you note for my assistance,” she says. “I’ll never forget the experience, nor that child’s act of kindness in the way she offered thanks.”

The moment helped motivate this BVU alumnus for decades and kept her thinking of ways she might serve others. Her servant-leadership continues as she tracks the growth and development of Buena Vista University, where one of her granddaughters, Carly Bundock, studies kinesiology as a senior.

“I’m happy to be in a position to share what I can with Buena Vista University, a place that really made a positive impact on my life,” Rozetta Hallcock says. “I had some great experiences as a student, and I just want to see that those experiences inside and outside the classroom continue to help others grow.”