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Betty Lou and James (Jim) Joanos are the consummate Seminole couple. Jim was a Florida State fan before FSU was known as the Seminoles. He attended the first FSU-Stetson game on October 18, 1947 over
one month before the student body adopted the Seminoles as our symbol. Jim and Betty Lou met at Florida State and have been together ever since. Both are FSU graduates, Jim graduated in 1956 and Betty
Lou earned her Bachelor's Degree in 1957 and PhD in 1985. While at FSU Jim was on the track team, was the freshman class president, a Senator as a sophomore and junior and Vice-president of the
student body as a senior and he was the sports editor of the Flambeau. Betty Lou was a member of the Circus, Village Vamps, Garnet Key, Sophomore Council, Junior Counselor, Secretary of the Sophomore
class, Queen of Freshman Carnival, Junior-Senior Prom Court and Who's Who. After Jim earned his law degree from Yale and served in the Air Force the couple returned to Tallahassee where they raised
their family and have been heavily involved with everything Florida State ever since. Jim worked as a lawyer and later for eight years as a trial judge on the Second Judicial Circuit of Florida. He is
also a former Chief Judge of Florida's First District Court of Appeal where he served as an appellate judge for 20 years. Jim is considered the FSU Athletics Historian. He has followed FSU athletics
since the beginning and he and Betty Lou have attended sporting events covering all FSU sports since early in school history. You can find them outside of Tallahassee at the ACC Championships for
football, basketball and baseball, bowl games and the college world series. Jim has written many historical FSU athletic articles for the Seminole Boosters, the Tallahassee Democrat and the Wakulla
Times. He was instrumental in the establishment of the FSU College of Law, where he served as adjunct professor from 1978 to 2001 andhe has served as president of the FSU Alumni Association. Some of
the positions Betty Lou has held at FSU include Chairman of the Board and later Associate Director of the Alumni Association and the Coordinator of Home Economics Programs. She has served on the Board
of Directors of the FSU Association of Retired Faculty and she is the recipient of the FSU "Faculty Senate" prestigious Mores Award. Jim was awarded the Alumni Association's Bernard Sliger Award and
Betty Lou has received numerous awards for her service in the Colleges of Communications, Education and Human Sciences. Both have received the FSU Emeritus Alumni Society's Award of Excellence, as
well as the Circle of Gold Award. Both have served as Co-Grand Marshals for the FSU Homecoming Parade and each is listed as One of FSU's 100 Distinguished Graduates.
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