Lillian F. Mayberry 19 May 1943–17 September 2025
Citation: The Journal of Parasitology 111, 6; 10.1645/25-82
This is for “Diamond Lil”
Lillian was someone you could love and trust. I have the utmost respect for those who can love, be loved, and be respected for the things that they accomplished throughout their lives but remain humble. Lillian was that person. What I hope to share here are a few of my personal memories and interactions with Lil.
Formative years
So, who was Lillian Mayberry before becoming a parasitologist? She was born in Portland, Oregon, and spent her 1st 8 years there. In the 1st and 2nd grade, she learned to twirl the baton and ice skate but secretly wanted to be a cowgirl when she grew up. During the 2nd grade, her parents moved to Yuma, Arizona, where she could be with horses and other animals on her grandfather’s farm … almost like being a young cowgirl. At the end of 3rd grade, her parents moved to San Jose, California, where she completed elementary and high school (HS). She was the valedictorian of her HS graduating class, and as we will see, an honor that was only the 1st of many she would earn throughout her life. In HS, she was active in music (cello), the 4-H club, formal dance, and sports (basketball), all while working several part-time jobs to earn spending money. Her many accomplishments beyond HS and the various degrees earned were summarized beautifully by Dr. Gilbert Castro in his introduction of Lillian as our ASP president (Castro, 1996, Journal of Parasitology 82: 855–856).
Early educational foundation
In 1963, Lillian earned an A.A. degree in Dental Assisting from San Jose City College and her B.A. in Life Science from California State University, San Jose (1967, with distinction). She then went to the University of Nevada–Reno (UN-R) to complete her M.S. in Biology (1970). She completed her Ph.D. in 1973 in the Department of Zoology and Entomology at Colorado State University (CSU) in Fort Collins.
Formative years at CSU
I was a student in Dr. Bill Marquardt’s lab at CSU in the fall of 1969, just beginning the last year of my Ph.D. program, and Bill had just recruited a new student to his lab to work on her Ph.D. I met Lil the 1st day she arrived on campus, and she did not yet have a place to live. I was in the middle of a week-long experiment, collecting and then processing fecal samples every 6 hours, so I was sleeping on the lab floor. We made an agreement: she could stay in my very small apartment for the week if she brought me lunch and dinner. That’s how we became friends.
In a sense, Lillian was my 1st graduate student. She was writing the thesis for her M.S. degree at the UN-R, which she finished in 1970. Being young and just entering science, she had never published a scientific paper and didn’t know where to start. As we became friends during 1969–1970, I worked with her over both semesters to convert her thesis verbiage into a more standardized format that would be acceptable for submission to a parasitology journal. Her paper was eventually published (1972) with her thesis advisor (E. D. Tibbits) in Zeitschrift für Parasitenkunde (38: 66–76).
It was immediately clear to me that Lillian was a trooper. She worked hard, and she worked long hours, and as you will learn, she did that for the remainder of her life. When we shared a lab at CSU, I would often work late at night, and she would be there “doing stuff” and learning techniques. I eventually asked her to help me with my research, which she did willingly on my final experiments for the Ph.D., while also starting her own work with other coccidia. So, if anyone is to blame for her becoming a coccidian biologist, I take full responsibility.
Lillian and I were both lucky to be in Dr. Marquardt’s lab because he did some things for his students that many mentors overlook. One was to take us to both regional and national parasitology meetings (in fact, the 3 of us are charter members of the Rocky Mountain Conference of Parasitology, founded by Bill and Dr. Datus Hammond at Utah State University). Bill did not abandon us while at these meetings; throughout each meeting, he went out of his way to introduce us to the leaders in our discipline whose papers we were (or should be) reading and citing, including, but not limited to, Drs. Norman Levine, Datus Hammond, Bill Campbell, Virginia Ivens, Ron Fayer, Peter Long, and many others. This mentoring allowed Lil and me to become great friends; we partied together, and we worked long nights in the lab together, activities that allowed us to develop a strong fondness for each other.
After graduating from CSU (August 1970), I took a job at the University of New Mexico, and in the spring of 1971, I met Dr. Jack Bristol, who also was a 1st-year assistant professor at the University of Texas–El Paso (UTEP). We went to Juarez, Mexico, to drink beer, we attended the Southwestern Association of Parasitologists meetings together, and we went to the University of New Mexico vs. UTEP football and basketball games together. We became very close friends and colleagues.
In a parallel universe, I stayed in touch with Lil who had finished her Ph.D. in 1973, stayed at CSU for another year as a postdoc in anatomy, and then accepted a 2-year postdoc (1974–1976) in molecular, cellular and developmental biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder (UC–Boulder). We continued our mutual friendship through phone calls and letters, without email, social media, or cell phones.
Lillian and ASP
Lillian joined ASP in 1968. She served 3 terms as our secretary–treasurer (1986–1993) and was the ASP president in 1996. The latter was noteworthy because she was the 1st woman in 20 years to be honored as president of ASP and only the 3rd in ASP history, at that time.
In November 1972, ASP met jointly with the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in Miami Beach. Lillian Mayberry and Jack Bristol, two of my best friends, also were in attendance. I introduced them to each other because I thought they shared a lot of personal and professional qualities … and everyone knows how that turned out. At UC–Boulder, but unbeknown to most, she and Jack corresponded and grew closer through personal visits in each direction. They were married on 22 August 1975 by a justice of the peace in Boulder. I was fortunate to be Jack’s best man and 1 of 2 witnesses to sign the marriage certificate. Today and forever, it is impossible to talk about Lil without including Jack in the conversation; they became inseparable as a couple, and their union made them iconic in ASP, almost like seeing the homecoming queen and king at each annual meeting. Between 1978 and 2005, Lillian served ASP by being appointed to 18 different committees in addition to serving as secretary–treasurer for 8 years (1986–1993), associate editor of our newsletter (1988–1995), and enduring the 4-year commitment of vice president (1993–1994), president-elect (1994–1995), president (1995–1996), and past-president (1996–1997). Finally, in 2006 at our meeting with ICOPA in Glasgow, Scotland, she was presented the ASP Distinguished Service Award. Her introduction by Dr. Robin Overstreet (2006, Journal of Parasitology 92: 1135) is enlightening and provides a deeper insight into the many other ways Lil contributed to keeping ASP moving and growing through the years.
Lillian and UTEP
After completing her postdoc in Boulder, Lil secured an adjunct assistant professor position at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces (1976–1980) and an adjunct assistant professorship at UTEP (1979), where she progressed through the ranks to full professor (1987). Sharing a lab with Jack Brisol at UTEP began an over 40-year collaboration and love affair in parasitology that produced an admirable record of scientific publications, mentoring graduate students, numerous presentations, collaborations, and active participation in professional organizations, all while providing a loving, secure, and nourishing home environment helping to raise Jack’s children, Scott and Kelly. Just a few brief comments regarding her accomplishments in these areas.
Administrative service:
Lillian served as the director of UTEP’s Honors and Junior Scholars Programs and as coordinator of the National Student Exchange Program, where she helped guide high-achieving students in their academic journeys. Her legacy also includes the coestablishment of the Bristol/Mayberry Endowed Award, which continues to support outstanding students in the fields of biology, microbiology, and environmental science. This award and scholarship was started by Dr. Russell Broaddus, one of the former students in the Mayberry–Bristol lab, because he was fond of Lillian and wanted to honor her for her teaching and mentoring skills. Dr. Broaddus is now head of pathology at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
Teaching and mentoring:
Lillian left behind a legacy that profoundly shaped the Biology Department at UTEP. She was a gifted classroom teacher. However, her greatest impact on the education of students came from working with them, side by side, in her laboratory. During her tenure, she was friend, confidant, and mentor to 37 students. Nearly half were women, two-thirds were Hispanics, and a few were ethnic minorities from Iraq, Egypt, and Croatia. A dozen of Lil’s students were Mexican American women, 6 of whom are now physicians. Five of her students attained Ph.D. degrees. Considering that most of her students came from moderate- to low-income families without a family tradition of higher education, these results of Lillian's mentorship were extraordinary. Her commitment to academic excellence and student development left a lasting impact on generations of scholars within the UTEP community by instilling in them a passion for science and an unwavering dedication to their academic and professional pursuits. This dedication garnered the Outstanding Advisor Award from the UTEP Student Association.
Scholarship:
Lillian had a productive career. She authored and coauthored more than 65 research articles, technical reports, books or book chapters, and miscellaneous papers; almost half of these involved the coccidia (!) and their relatives. Being broadly trained, her research involved a wide variety of hosts (birds, fish, and mammals), parasites (coccidia, nematodes, trematodes, cestodes, and bacteria), and approaches (surveys, biochemistry and histochemistry, physiology, pathology, parasite competition, and probing cellular and subcellular responses to parasites), with a truly interdisciplinary and renaissance approach. Her breadth of knowledge and her excitement of discovery was easily shared with her students. It was research that connected Lil to Dr. Gilbert Castro at the medical school in Houston. Over the years, she sent students from her lab to his to learn a method or technique that interested them, which they would then take back to UTEP to use. For 25 years, she worked continuously to generate funding (∼US$700,000) to support underprivileged students long before it became a national movement in academia. Her scholarly achievements were instrumental in obtaining training grants to educate undergraduate and master’s students at UTEP. Her Minority Biomedical Research Support grant provided financial support that enabled many of her students to remain in college. Her receipt of a Fulbright Research Fellowship to collaborate with colleagues in what was then Yugoslavia was a milestone in her career, achieved by her dedication and scholarly approach to her work. In 1995, she received the Honor Alumni Award from CSU.
Community service:
In El Paso, Lillian established the Latch Key Centers Unlimited for barrio children and participated in the mother and daughter program at UTEP. She was involved in the Teen Learning Center, United Way, and El Paso Council for International Visitors. For her volunteer work, Lillian was honored as the recipient of the REACH Award from the El Paso YMCA, and Unsung Heroine Award from the El Paso Woman’s Coalition, and General Motors Outstanding Service Award.
Lillian Mayberry, the person
Lillian and Jack’s marriage spanned nearly 50 years. In Jack Bristol’s in memoriam (Donald W. Duszynski, 2023, Journal of Parasitology 109: 178–180), I shared the following thoughts, and because they were inseparable both in marriage and in their personalities, some of what I wrote bears repeating. As we grow and evolve through our lives, we create ripples in the minds of most people we encounter: those we love, the lives we touch in classrooms as teachers and mentors, the people we meet in our local community, and even our neighbors. The impressions we leave behind, no matter how trivial, are evidence that we coexisted. No one gets off this rock alive, and when we pass, those ripples continue to radiate from the memories and stories of those still here. Diamond Lil is not gone, if we remember the human qualities she shared with us. Almost everyone who met her might characterize her as a kind, caring, and loving soul. To her close friends and students, she was much more than that. In a recent email, Dr. Gilbert Castro wrote, “Lillian’s personal qualities included loyalty, courage, desire, discipline, stamina, empathy, decisiveness, competitiveness, self-confidence, accountability, credibility, self-sacrifice, stewardship, and, importantly, delayed gratification.” The latter meaning she helped others, while making as little splash as possible; she didn’t need or want to step into the limelight.
Lillian’s legacy remains embodied in her stepchildren, Scott Bristol of Golden, Colorado (granddaughter Logan), and Kelly Lipsteuer of Littleton, Colorado (grandsons Garrett and Spencer and granddaughter Kendall). Scott and Kelly and their children are not planning an immediate memorial service but will celebrate her life at a later date. Their plan is to spread her ashes with some of Jack’s at Chautauqua Park above Boulder, which is a place both Jack and Lil loved. In honor of Lillian’s legacy in education, mentorship, and community service at UTEP and in El Paso, donations may be made to the Bristol/Mayberry Endowed Award fund at UTEP and addressed and mailed to the Office of Institutional Advancement, made through the website at givingto.utep.edu, or by calling 915-474-0100.
Writing this in memoriam was a labor of true love, but it would not have been possible without the helpful suggestions of Dr. Gilbert Castro and my wife and friend, Lee Couch.
Contributor Notes