Charlene Smeltzer Lugar, 1954
B.A., Denison University
Vice Chairman, Board of Trustees
March of Dimes Foundation
Citation awarded in June, 1994
Charlene Smeltzer Lugar has served on the Board of Trustees of the National March of Dimes since 1984 and was elected its vice chairman in 1990. This national service followed her chairmanship of Hoosier Heartland Chapter’s Mothers March of Dimes during which she was awarded the March of Dimes Partners in Science Award.
She established the Charlene S. Lugar Birth Defects Grant Fund, a restricted gift trust of the march of Dimes Birth Defects Foundation and personally raised nearly $1 million for health education and medical services programs in Indianapolis.
Char has served four years on the Board of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists as its National Public Member. She was selected on the basis of her reputation as a state and national leader in fighting birth defects and in establishing healthy babies programs.
From its outset, she has served as honorary co-chair of the Indianapolis Campaign for Healthy Babies giving speeches throughout the country on health problems of infants and children.
Char also has served as a director of the Wishard Memorial Hospital Foundation, member of the Board of Philanthropy at Indiana University, and Chairman of the Mothers March of Dimes for five years in Indianapolis.
She has volunteered for Denison as an alumni club president in Indianapolis, and served as honorary co-chair of the Campaign for Denison in Washington, D.C.
Char has shared the campaign trail with her husband, Dick ’54. They have raised four sons and live in Washington, D.C.
