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Ronald Alan Busse has been recently awarded the 2011 Migliore Award for Lifetime Achievement by the MIA. |
Busse began his career in the stone industry in 1951 when he started working for Tennessee Marble. "When I started at Tennessee Marble, I was about as low as you can get in the business; I did a little janitorial work," said Busse, recalling his first days in our industry. "I was what they called a mill clerk. I was mainly a runner from the main office to the mill office. And, then as things progressed, I got into shipping and a lot of other things." Later, Tennessee Marble sent him to night school at the University of Tennessee to learn architectural drafting. By 1975, Busse started his own fabricating company, Busse Marble Co., in Smithfield, TX. Beginning with just two workers in the shop, Busse Marble eventually grew into a firm of 75 fabricators and installers.
Busse first became involved in MIA in 1960. Later in his career he became more involved in the association when he became a member of the MIA Board of Directors in 1979. By 1988, Busse assumed the position of MIA President.
Busse was very involved in the creation and publication of both volumes of MIA's Dimension Stones of the World. The reference books were made available to the stone industry, to architects, and others in the design community. The "color plate books," as they became known, are still being sold through the MIA bookstore.
By serving as an author and technical advisor, he played an important role in the updating of MIA's Dimension Stone Design Manual, Volume IV. He served the MIA in the additional capacity of Technical Director from 1990 to 1995, and when Vince Migliore, for whom MIA's lifetime achievement award is named, passed away suddenly in 2003, Busse was pressed into service in January 2004 until a permanent replacement was hired.
