A Sooner Family

Keeping it all in the family resonates with many Sooners and their offspring; however, the Strange family really takes that saying to heart when it comes to OU and the Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communication. Their love and loyalty to the crimson and cream runs deep. Not only is Marylee Strange an alumna but so are her daughters Juliann and Katylee along with sons-in-law Scott Moehlenbrock and Dr. Jack Test. It seems the only “outsider” is Marylee’s husband, Tim, who likes to remind everyone that both of his parents, his stepfather, and his grandmother all graduated from the University of Oklahoma so he’s a Sooner by default. 

Marylee Trigg Strange graduated from the University of Oklahoma with two journalism degrees, a bachelor’s in 1976 and a master’s in 1977. While in the journalism program, Marylee served as a graduate assistant from September of 1976 to May of 1977. 

“I was assigned to Professor Paschal in the OIPA office,” Maylee said. “I have two longtime friends from that time. Ann Dee Lee and Bill Young worked in the office with us, and we have remained great friends.” 

OIPA, or the Oklahoma Interscholastic Press Association, is currently known as OSM, Oklahoma Scholastic Media, a high school press association that was initially fashioned after the Texas Interscholastic Press Association at Baylor University. With the demise of TIPA, OIPA became the only interscholastic press association in the nation. It is currently the oldest continuously active group focused on high school publications. Ironically, Professor H.H. Herbert was elected the group’s first leader and initiated the first interscholastic meet for high school journalists in 1916. Professor James Paschal served as the group’s executive director from 1963 to 1991. The group’s top award is named after Paschal due to his dedication to the organization which is currently housed in the Gaylord College of Journalism.

It was Marylee’s exposure to OIPA as a high school student that led her to choose journalism as her major. 

“Each year of high school, we took a day field trip to an OIPA event at OU,” Marylee said. “It was fun to be at OU, and the sessions were great. I was thrilled to later work as a graduate assistant in that office at OU and get to know some of the session leaders from my high school sessions.” 

Most notably, Marylee met Dr. Mario Garcia through her involvement with OIPA. Dr. Garcia is the CEO and founder of Garcia Media, a newspaper and media design firm, and an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s journalism school. Marylee likes to share her favorite memory of Dr. Garcia: while dining at a Norman restaurant, he edited the menu and gave it back to the waiter. 

Marylee started her career in Dallas, working as a management trainee for a large corporation. Her plan was to eventually work in the company’s corporate communications department, but fate stepped in. As Marylee was rotating through the various departments, she discovered computer programming and the rest is history. She stayed in the IT field as a programmer, project manager and department manager for 27 years. In the early 2000’s, she joined her husband in his commercial real estate company where she serves as director of marketing. 

So, what about the rest of the family? Well, daughter Juliann Strange Test graduated from Gaylord and began her career in the nonprofit arena with OKC Beautiful. Currently, she is a residential realtor with Re/Max First, selling homes in Oklahoma City and Tulsa. She specializes in working with new resident physicians and attending physicians because she understands their unique perspectives and challenging work schedules. Since her family was in real estate, it was a natural career path. 

“Real estate became the family business just about the time I was born,” she said, “and I always knew I would join it.” 

Her husband, Dr. Jack Test, attended OU Medical School and completed his residency in Internal Medicine at OU Tulsa. He is a board-certified internal medicine physician working as a hospitalist at St. John in Tulsa. Juliann and Jack have two future Sooners: son Trigg who is 3 years old and daughter Lauralee who is 1. Trigg has been to three OU home football games and told his grandmother that the games were “a blast.” 

Marylee’s other daughter, Katylee Strange Moehlenbrock, graduated from Gaylord and began her career as an account executive at a public relations agency. Her career has taken her to food service and now to healthcare where she serves as professional relations coordinator for Triad Eye Institute in Tulsa. 

Katylee’s husband, Scott, also graduated from Gaylord and his career path took him into construction and real estate development. Currently he is senior construction and development project manager for Reunion Building in Tulsa. Katylee and Scott met in the spring of 2021 in Al Eschbach’s sports writing class. As Katylee tells it, Scott took the course because he loves sports, and she took it because she was ahead in her degree plan and needed an elective. 

“We interacted occasionally in class but got to know each other outside of class as well,” Katie said. “Every time we see Al, we remind him how we met in his class and that we are married because of him.” 

Scott remembers the moment it all began. 

“One of the last classes of the year, Al took us all to New York Pizza for a pizza party,” he said. “I sat next to the cute girl and got her phone number. The rest is history.” 

Katylee and Scott speak highly of the skill sets they learned while at Gaylord and encourage students to take advantage of all opportunities offered by the school. 

“In every one of my jobs since college, communication, collaboration and strategy have been integral parts of my job,” Katie said. “Being a journalism major, you can easily transition to any job in the marketing or advertising field because they all have fundamental similarities. I have been fortunate enough to experience a variety of jobs in different industries, but the one thing that remained constant was the tried-and-true tools you learn in college.” 

Todd has high praise for his capstone class and credits Gaylord with preparing him for his current job. 

“My advertising capstone class was extremely relevant to my current job,” Scott explained. “The class required long-term planning, taught many valuable lessons about how to work together as a group and critical problem-solving skills that have translated directly to my day-to-day workflow. I currently spend a good deal of time preparing and making presentations like my class work in the College of Journalism.”