One voice, many decades of devotion: Guy Lohman ’71 is the 2026 recipient of the Alumni Distinguished Service Award.
Lohman studying at his desk in Clark I residence hall, where he was a resident assistant for three years.
Members of the Kappa Theta Epsilon fraternity. Standing: Paul Nicholson, Rett Bull, Pete Huisking, Rich Poppen, Rich Moran, Andy Bonin, Steve Moore, Steve Morrissett; Sitting: Lohman, unknown, Phil Robbs, Dick Mendenhall, Steve Lansdowne, Keith Beavon.
Guy Lohman ’71 was there when “Chirp!” was born — and he’s been chirping ever since.
During Lohman’s time in Pomona College’s pep band, the group helped spark what would become one of the College’s most enduring traditions. The iconic Sagehen slogan traces its roots to those early days at football games, when a fellow member began “chirping” from the stands in response to the long-standing tradition of a growl at kick-off.
Lohman and his bandmates happily joined in. He says what started as a playful rallying cry quickly spread across campus, eventually becoming a defining expression of Pomona spirit — even appearing on former College President David Alexander’s license plate.
“The rest was history,” Lohman says.
Now, Lohman is making a different kind of Pomona history as this year’s recipient of the Alumni Distinguished Service Award, in conjunction with his 55th class reunion.
Established in 1990, the award honors alumni who have given unheralded, selfless and direct service to the College over a sustained period. Lohman’s record reflects the very spirit of the honor, having served on every class reunion committee since his 15th reunion. This year, he’s co-chair of his 55th class reunion committee.
“I am extremely humbled and thrilled by this honor,” Lohman says. “I find Sagehens to be such interesting, curious and enlightened people, and it’s been a genuine pleasure staying connected to the alumni community all these years.”
Lohman has been involved with the College every single decade since graduating. He held leadership roles with the Pasadena Alumni Board, Pomona’s Alumni Peninsula Chapter, a precursor of the Bay Area chapter, and served on the College’s Alumni Board. He also volunteered his time to be an alumni admissions interviewer for 18 years.
“Guy’s devotion to the College is evident in his consistent presence, generosity and willingness to give his time and energy,” says Frank Albinder ’80, Alumni Board and Past President’s Council member. “He represents the very best of what it means to be a Sagehen.”
A mathematics major at Pomona, Lohman was active in campus life as a student, participating in the pep band, orchestra, Kappa Theta Epsilon fraternity, the Outdoor Club and was a resident assistant in Clark I residence hall for three years. Lohman credits those experiences — especially his time as a resident assistant — with shaping his outlook long after graduation.
That mindset carried him through more than three decades at IBM’s Almaden Research Center, where he managed a team prototyping and developing disruptive architectures for IBM’s information management software products and contributed to scholarly research on Structured Query Language (SQL) optimization. Before joining IBM, Lohman served as a group supervisor at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where he authored a proposal to the U.S. Geological Survey to develop a multimodal sensor network for earthquake prediction in California and worked on databases for data collected by earth-orbiting satellites.
He earned both his master’s and doctoral degrees in operations research from Cornell University. Since retiring, he has volunteered as a math tutor for high school students.
“Pomona’s influence extended well beyond my career — it had a great benefit on shaping who I am as a person,” Lohman recounts. “The faculty taught me that lifelong curiosity is the essence of a truly educated person.”
Visit our webpage to learn more about Pomona’s 2026 alumni award honorees.