Bezilla, Michael

Michael Bezilla (1950- ), railroad, agricultural, and Pennsylvania State University historian and author, directs the Department of Advancement Projects and Communications at Penn State, and writes history for popular and academic audiences. Born in Osceola Mills and educated at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania State University, he has served as historian for Penn State and is the author of Penn State: An Illustrated History.

Michael Bezilla, Penn State alumnus, is a director in Penn State University Relations. He has authored many books including Penn State an Illustrated History. Jack Rudnicki, also a Penn State alumnus, is a supply chain management graduate and railroad history enthusiast who works in sales management for the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad Railway.

Michael Bezilla was born in Osceola Mills on 8 March 1950. He graduated with a B.S. from the Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 1972, and earned his M.A. from Pennsylvania State University in 1975 and his Ph.D in 1978. Dr. Bezilla served as a research assistant for WPSX-TV (1975-1978), then as author of histories of Penn State engineering (1978-1979), the university (1979-1983), and the agriculture program (1983). In 1985, Penn State President John Oswald commissioned Bezilla to write Penn State: An Illustrated History. Bezilla's objective was to update and continue Wayland Dunaway's history of the university, published in 1946. In the book, Bezilla notes that his work was meant "to guide and to inform, rather than to commemorate." Bezilla is a member of the Organization of American Historians, the Society for the History of Technology, the Railroad and Locomotive Historical Society, the Pennsylvania Historical Association, the Central Pennsylvania Society to Promote Animal Welfare and Safety (serving as a member of the board of directors, 1980-1982), the Girl Scouts of the United States of America, and a member of Pennsylvania History's editorial board. He currently is the director of the Advancement Projects and Communications Department, in the Office of University Relations, at the Pennsylvania State University. This office is responsible for increasing public awareness and reputation of Penn State, including supporting the university's private funding-raising program, managing various brochures and other publications, and maintaining the historical markers on campus.