By Alin K. Gregorian
Mirror-Spectator Staff
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — About 250 supporters gathered on Thursday, May 24 at the Royal Sonesta Hotel Boston, to help the Armenian Mirror-Spectator celebrate its 80th anniversary with a program that paid tribute to its past, present and future.
During the program, emceed by Carolyn Atinizian-Yardemian, which raised about $80,000 gross for the maintenance and operation of the newspaper, as well as its technology expansion plans, three people were honored. Dr. Gregory Adamian, the retired longtime president of Bentley University — in fact the person who has allowed Bentley to be a university instead of a college, was able to attend the program, despite suffering from poor health recently. He received the newspaper’s lifetime achievement award. Adamian, who was controlling his emotions with difficulty, spoke about his illustrious career. However, he reserved his highest praise for his wife, Debbie, whom he credited with saving his life after he suffered a heart attack earlier in the month, after attending the Diocesan Assembly in Springfield, MA.
Receiving awards of excellence were NBC News correspondent Janet Shamlian and Politico national political editor Charles Mahtesian.
Shamlian spoke about how happy she was to be back within the fold of the Armenian community. The mother-of-five, who lives in Houston, said she wished her father were alive to see how she and her sister, who lost their mother as teens, had succeeded in the field she had always loved. She spoke about her circuitous and improbable journey from a local correspondent to housewife to a national correspondent for NBC. She said she would watch newscasts obsessively, correcting reporters both in terms of grammar and content, often talking to the television set, much to the amusement of her husband. “Now when I talk to Matt Lauer, he actually answers back,” she said.
