Pepperdine University

Pepperdine University professor John D. Nicks Jr. of Westlake Village died Saturday at Los Robles Regional Medical Center in Thousand Oaks. He was 58. Nicks was born Feb. 4, 1941, in Albuquerque. He attended grade school and high school there before enrolling at Abilene Christian University in Texas. He graduated in 1963 with a bachelor's degree in religion. Nicks met his future wife at the university, and the couple married on June 2, 1961. Nicks moved from Texas to Corvallis, Ore.

An environmental crusader known as "Mr. Malibu" has apologized to Pepperdine University and retracted accusations that the school is to blame for effluent flowing down Marie Canyon Creek and into the Pacific Ocean. In exchange, the university has agreed to drop a lawsuit against activist Cary ONeal that alleged libel and "invasion of privacy by placing person in a false light in public eye. " In two videos he posted online, ONeal claimed that a foamy substance pooling on a Malibu beach was sewage released by Pepperdine.

For three of the members of the Lyric Piano Quartet, Sunday's concert in Pepperdine University's Smothers Theatre was a kind of homecoming, since each had at some point called Los Angeles home. And what a homecoming it was. The quartet offered not only stunning accuracy and faultless precision of ensemble, but also spellbinding intensity, incandescent passion and soaring lyricism. The heavily Romantic agenda afforded many opportunities for these qualities.

Will somebody come clean about those soap-like bubbles in Malibu's tiny Marie Canyon Creek? A legal battle between an environmental crusader and Pepperdine University is raising questions about a frothy cascade of storm water that periodically spills over a beach lined with celebrity homes and into the Pacific Ocean. Videographer Cary ONeal, who blogs as "Mr. Malibu," insists that the runoff is tainted by a sewage treatment plant that serves the university and a housing tract next door, and that the school should be held to task for it. Pepperdine officials dispute that and have gone to court to prevent ONeal's accusation and home-made videos of the sudsy flow from going viral.

Jerry Rushford is the hymn trivia king. In nearly 30 years of research, the Pepperdine University religion professor has cultivated an unending repertoire of little-known facts about hymns--songs that praise God. "I'm not musically talented at all," said Rushford, 51, who estimates that he has researched 500 to 600 hymns. "I'm just fascinated by the origins of these hymns."

Former Pepperdine University accounting instructor Joseph V. Nash was sentenced in federal court Monday to 11 years in prison for defrauding four Southern California banking institutions of nearly $900,000. In handing down the lengthy sentence, U.S. District Judge Laughlin E. Waters described Nash as an "engaging" figure who nonetheless "was not to be trusted." The judge ordered Nash to pay $893,000 in restitution to the four financial institutions.

When Iraq invaded Kuwait in August, 1990, Adam Housley was able to tap an authoritative source of information to supplement what he was seeing on the TV news: His Kuwaiti roommate at Pepperdine University, who had just escaped his homeland, helped close the gap between the cultures and explain what happened. After Pepperdine international students stood atop the Berlin Wall as it began to crumble, they returned with eyewitness accounts of history unfolding.

Once the site of a bustling university campus, the dusty, weedy lot at the corner of 81st Street and Vermont Avenue is strewn with trash and debris. The property, which is barren and has been in disrepair for two decades, clashes with the well-kept homes of the nearby Vermont Knolls neighborhood. But by the middle of next year, construction will begin on a housing and commercial development project on the land, the site of Pepperdine University before it moved to Malibu in 1972.

Showing talents in comedy as well as verse, Maya Angelou celebrated African-American poetry before an audience of about 2,000 at Pepperdine University Wednesday night. During her 90-minute performance, attended by a multiethnic assembly of students, alumni and fans from all over Southern California, Angelou recited her work and that of others. She encouraged the audience "to make this country more than it is today." She urged students to ask librarians for the poetry of African-Americans.

A $1.5-million gift from Los Angeles industrialist and art collector Frederick R. Weisman has thrust Pepperdine University's art gallery into the limelight. Upon receipt of the gift, which was announced Thursday, the year-old gallery in Malibu will be renamed the Frederick R. Weisman Museum of Art. "It's very exciting. What could be better than having a museum in my hometown?" Weisman said.

Although George Winston cites his musical influences as New Orleans R&B pianists, the impressionistic and visionary stylist also lends his talents to Hawaiian slack-key guitar and solo harmonica. One hundred percent of Winston's proceeds from this benefit concert will be donated to City of Hope Cancer Research. Smothers Theatre, Pepperdine University, 24255 Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu. 8 p.m. Fri. $25-$45. (310) 506-4522. arts.pepperdine.edu.

Rhoda-May Adamson Dallas, an heir of a pioneering Malibu family who, with her siblings, donated the land that enabled Pepperdine University to establish its campus overlooking the Pacific, has died. She was 94. Dallas died Oct. 14 of natural causes at her longtime home in Studio City, her family said. She was the granddaughter of businessman Frederick H. Rindge, who bought a former Spanish land grant in Malibu in 1892 and expanded it into a 17,000-acre working ranch. Rhoda-May, born on Feb. 14, 1917, in Santa Monica, spent much of her early life on a choice slice of that land in a Spanish-style oceanfront house built in 1930 as a weekend retreat for her parents, the former Rhoda Agatha Rindge and her husband, Merritt Adamson.

Pepperdine University on Thursday named a federal appeals court judge from Kansas to succeed former special prosecutor Kenneth Starr as dean of its law school. Deanell Reece Tacha has been a federal judge on the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals since her 1985 appointment by President Reagan. She also has served on the Judicial Conference of the United States, the federal court system's policymaking body, as well as on the U.S. Sentencing Commission that sets guidelines and punishment ranges for those convicted in federal courts.

An overwhelming majority of business owners say they have plans to expand their companies, but relatively few have the capital to do it, according to a new study. Nationwide, just 40% of privately held businesses said they have the resources to grow, said John Paglia, who surveyed 559 businesses and 1,430 lenders and investors for the Pepperdine University Private Markets Capital Project. The findings come at a time when there is national concern about small business' access to loans.

Kenneth Starr, the former special prosecutor who took on President Clinton over the Whitewater and Monica Lewinsky scandals, will be leaving his post as dean of Pepperdine University School of Law this spring to become president of Baylor University in Waco, Texas, the schools announced Monday. Starr has headed the Malibu law school since 2004. During his West Coast tenure, he also represented the supporters of Proposition 8, which bans same-sex marriage, during a challenge before the California Supreme Court last year.

Jay Reatard Punk rocker in Memphis Jay Reatard, 29, a punk rocker known for performing shows and releasing singles at a breakneck pace, was found dead in his bed early Wednesday in Memphis, Tenn. Memphis police are investigating his death, but police spokeswoman Jennifer Robinson said foul play is not necessarily suspected. Friends of Reatard told the Commercial Appeal newspaper that the singer had been complaining of flu-like symptoms. An autopsy was performed Wednesday and the results are pending.

Memorial services for Helen Pepperdine, a benefactor of Pepperdine University who died of heart failure Oct. 5, are scheduled for 10 a.m. Monday at Firestone Fieldhouse on the Pepperdine University campus, 24255 Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu.

Andy Read, 29, coach at Marina High in Huntington Beach for the last three years, has become an assistant men's volleyball coach at Pepperdine University.

For now, at least, the UCLA basketball team will have to suffice with small improvements, glimmers of progress. Baby steps. Still looking to work their way back from a season-opening loss, the Bruins kept moving in the right direction with a 71-52 victory over Pepperdine on Monday night. "I'm sure losing that game hurt everybody," Coach Ben Howland said of the opener. "It should hurt. And that's motivation." Playing before another small crowd at Pauley Pavilion, his team finally showed hints of the pressure defense for which Howland's program has been known over the last few seasons.

Mitrice Richardson is afraid of the dark and always has been, says her mother, Latice Sutton, who remembers that quirk when she thinks about her daughter's release from a jail cell at a Los Angeles County sheriff's substation in Calabasas in the predawn hours of Sept. 17. Wearing jeans and a dark T-shirt, Richardson, 24, had no car, no cellphone and no purse as she left the station about 1:25 a.m. The nearest Starbucks and fast-food restaurants are about a mile away in a shopping area.