Mary and Jim Quello met as undergraduate students at Michigan State University and were married on September 14, 1937. In the words of former MSU Trustee, Dolores Cook, “Mary was the perfect match for Jim, able to hold her own in any situation and match her husband’s wit and charm with her own.” While assisting Jim in his careers in broadcasting and at the FCC, Mary had a distinguished career of her own as a women’s fashion designer. The Quello Center lost a wonderful friend and invaluable supporter with the passing of Mary B. Quello on October 25, 1999, and then with the death of Jim on the 24th of January 2010.
In a salute to MSU in the last chapter of James Quello’s My Wars (p. 143), he wrote that it was ‘the ultimate honor that our names are associated with our beloved alma mater in perpetuity … For me, it is the capstone of a long and varied communications career that began with the Michigan State News and at WKAR, the 5,000 watt college radio station. I’m taking this opportunity to express my thanks to Michigan State University, to President Peter McPherson, Communications Dean Jim Spaniolo and to the generous contributors to the [Quello] Center for making possible this memorable, gratifying and most enduring of our life-time accomplishments.’