Dave Phillips Receives Choate School Award

June 23, 2010  by in UnCategorized   

By Home Furnishings Business in Community/Charitable Support on June 24, 2010

Dave Phillips, former U.S. Ambassador and founder of furniture industry financial services company and Phillips Factors Corp. and textile manufacturer Phillips Mills, has received the 2010 Choate Seal Prize, the highest alumnus honor from the Choate School in Wallingford, Conn.

The award recognizes an alumnus for outstanding leadership and for making significant contributions to country, community and the school. As an honoree, Phillips joins such notables as President John F. Kennedy, Adlai Stevenson, Paul Mellon, Edward Albee, Glenn Close, Ali MacGraw, Jamie Lee Curtis and Michael Douglas.

Phillips was the founding chairman of Phillips Factors Corp., which provided financial services to the furniture industry and merged with BB&T Corp.  He also founded Phillips Mills, which merged with Culp Inc. Phillips was a founding partner in the Market Square Partnership, which provided showrooms to the furniture industry and merged with Vornado Realty Trust.

A businessman, philanthropist, civic leader, and former North Carolina Secretary of Commerce, Phillips brought tremendous experience to his service as a U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Estonia.

Upon receiving the award, Phillips told the nearly 1,000 students and faculty about his experience as one of the school's first exchange students to attend Moscow State University and about his travels extensively throughout Russia, Ukraine, Georgia and Poland during the Cold War. It was this experience, Phillips said, that prepared him for his role, nearly 45 years later, as ambassador to the former Soviet Republic.