In May 1962 a team of four UT students appeared on the popular television quiz contest, the GE College Bowl. Team members, coached by Dr. Isabel Tipton, professor of physics, were David Rubin, an Oak Ridge senior majoring in French and English; Joe Gorman, a Knoxville senior majoring in history and law; and Knoxville sophomores Harold Wimberly, a physics student, and Anne Dempster, a fine arts major. The other eight finalists, who were designated as alternates, were William Boone, Caroline Cook, Linda Doyle, Richard Hale, Charles Huddleston, Alvin Sanders, Donald Shull, and Richard Ward.
For each victory, the winning team’s school received $1,500 in scholarship money. A loss netted $500. The team won four matches (Manhattan College, Kings College of Wilkes-Barre Pennsylvania, the University of Rhode Island, and St. Olaf College of Northfield Minnesota) before losing on June 3 to the University of Rochester in the last televised episode of the program.
A tickertape parade down Gay Street celebrated their fourth win. A GE College Bowl Scholarship Fund was begun with the $6,500 won by the team and was to be supplemented by gifts until the fund reached $50,000. Mayor John Duncan, a UT graduate, launched the campaign with a gift of $100. The first scholarship award was made in 1963 to alternate team member William Boone. Within five years, however, the scholarship had lost its identity, and the approximately $11,000 in contributions received were absorbed by the General Scholarship Fund.