Barbara McCutchan
Barbara and her husband, Ronnie Hise, live locally south of Garth Newel in the countryside north of Covington. She grew up on a prune-pear-wine grape ranch as one of six children in Sonoma County, CA, moving to the East Coast for graduate school and then work, settling back in this area after concluding her corporate role.
Barbara’s musical peak performing French horn was as a high school senior with soloist performance in the Michael Ritchie movie “Smile.” She resumed horn playing, performing on the Garth Newel stage during the Amateur weekends 2016–2019 with a wind group. Barbara and Ronnie have been Patrons with the Emerging Artists since 2018, hosting a BBQ pool party at their home.
Barbara earned her forestry undergraduate degree at the University of California, Berkeley, where she was on the first women’s crew team beating all West Coast competitors, enabled by Title IX. She worked at a forest genetics research station in West Germany before heading to North Carolina State University for her graduate degrees in forest genetics.
She worked as a Forest Geneticist and then Sustainable Development Director for Westvaco Corporation. She had several consulting roles following her corporate roles before becoming Adjunct professor at Virginia Tech executive master’s program and then at Arizona State University online master’s program (before virtual instruction was cool).
Barbara has board experience locally (Greenbrier Chapter of Sigma Xi, Jackson River Enterprises, Alleghany Foundation and Alleghany Highlands Arts Council) and on the NC State College of Natural Resources Foundation, and is involved in Covington’s First Presbyterian Church leading mission efforts.
Her passions are her family, international travel sparked by being a high school exchange student in South Africa, and enjoying the outdoors with coordination of a local Monday Hiking group.
