Alumni
2000 Distinguished Alumnus
This award salutes the achievement of outstanding Penn State alumni whose "personal lives, professional achievements, and community service exemplify the objectives of their alma mater." It is the highest honor bestowed on a graduate of the University and is sponsored and administered by the Penn State Board of Trustees.
Since the inception of the Distinguished Alumni Award, more than thirty College of Agricultural Sciences graduates have received this very special distinction.
Dairy Science
Charlie Brosius, a leading figure in the world's mushroom industry and former Pennsylvania secretary of agriculture, has been named a 2000 Penn State Distinguished Alumnus, the University's highest alumni award. Brosius, a native of West Grove, Pennsylvania, has achieved an international reputation as an innovator in mushroom cultivation and marketing. The Brosius family business, Marlboro Mushrooms (from which he retired as president in 1995), led the state industry in adapting and developing production techniques to meet the growing fresh-market demand in the 1960s.
His lecturing, sponsored research and published papers continue to establish him as a national authority in mushroom production. He was recently appointed to serve on the National Mushroom Council by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
He served as Pennsylvania Secretary of Agriculture from March 1995 through May 1997. As secretary, he chaired the Commissions of Animal Health, Soil Conservation, Farm Show, Horse Racing, and Farmland Preservation, as well as many other boards. He was instrumental in the formation of the Penn State Agricultural Law Center, a partnership with the Dickinson School of Law.
After graduating from Penn State in 1952 with a bachelor's degree in dairy science, Brosius managed the family's dairy and mushroom farm, overseeing its concentration on mushroom production and its development of marketing for the New York City fresh markets, with emphasis on Asian produce buyers and subsequent expansion and acquisition of a distribution/trucking concern and real estate holding company. As a member of the Penn State Board of Trustees from 1989 through 1997, he chaired the Hershey Medical Center Advisory Committee. He served on the board of directors of the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry, and as vice-chairman of the board of directors of Agway, Inc. farm supply cooperative. He is also a former director of Telmark, Inc., an agricultural easing and financing company.
From 1989 until 1995, he was a director and finance chairman for Curtice Burns Foods, Inc., a national food processing and marketing corporation. In 1978, he was recognized as a Pennsylvania Master Farmer, and has been honored with the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau Distinguished Service to Agriculture Award, the Chester County Commissioners' Agricultural Leadership Award and the American Mushroom Institute Distinguished Service Award.
Currently, Brosius sits on the Penn State Great Valley Advisory Board, and chairs the Penn State Great Valley Grand Destiny Campaign. He is a member of the National Alpha Zeta and Gamma Sigma Delta agricultural fraternities and the Penn State Coaly Honor Society. He has received the College of Agricultural Sciences Outstanding Alumnus and the Alpha Kappa Gamma Distinguished Alumnus Awards.
Presently retired, Brosius lives in West Grove, Pa. with his wife, Jane, a 1952 Penn State graduate. Their sons, all involved in the family business, are Mahlon G. Brosius, 1978 Penn State Ag Business Management; Thomas K. Brosius, 1979 Penn State Ag Engineering; and Harold E. Brosius, 1980 Penn State Ag Engineering.
