Junior Achievement of Southwestern Indiana announced the 2025 JA Dubois County Business Hall of Fame Laureates at a press conference on Thursday, Jan. 9, at the Dubois County Museum. The 2025 laureates are H.E. (Herb) Thyen and Sue Ellspermann. Laureates will be inducted into JA Dubois County Business Hall of Fame on Thursday, May 1st at 7:30 am ET, at The Huntingburg Event Center.
The announcement was made by Christian Blome, Being for Others Health and Wellness Foundation. “Mr. Thyen and Mrs. Ellspermann are two remarkable leaders joining a distinguished group of innovators who exemplify Junior Achievement’s vision that our young people have the skillset and mindset to build thriving communities.”
The JA Dubois County Business Hall of Fame honors members of the Dubois County Business Community who exhibit strong vision, innovation, inspiring leadership and are visionaries within their respective industries. A crystal eagle symbolizing the spirit of free enterprise is presented to each laureate. A monument with a citation and image of each laureate will also be displayed at the Dubois County Museum.
SUE ELLSPERMANN: Ivy Tech Community College (Active)
It would be difficult to find another resident from Dubois County more accomplished than Sue Ellspermann. Sue Ellspermann served one term in the Indiana House during the 2011–12 legislative session. She served on the committees for: Commerce, Small Business and Economic Development, Elections and Apportionment, Employment, Labor and Pensions (vice chair). She represented Warrick, Spencer and parts of Dubois and Perry County.
She was sworn in as the 50th Lieutenant Governor of Indiana on January 14, 2013, succeeding two-term incumbent Becky Skillman. As lieutenant governor, Ellspermann headed the Indiana State Department of Agriculture, the Office of Energy Development, the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority, the Office of Community and Rural Affairs and the Office of Tourism Development.
Her current role is serving as President of Ivy Tech Community College since July 1, 2016. Sue recently brought CDL program to Dubois County.
Some of her notable work includes: Founded business consulting firm Ellspermann and Associates Inc., 2006 Founding Director of University of Indiana’s Center for Applied Research, and 2012 Director of Strategic Engagement for the strategic marketing firm Transformation Team Inc.
Sue has severed on several boards which include: Conexus Indiana, Indiana Conference for Women, One America, Ascend Indiana, Women’s Fund of Central Indiana. Ellspermann is a resident of Ferdinand, Indiana, with her husband Jim Mehling, the former principal of Forest Park High School. They have four adult daughters.
Sue is a Roman Catholic and a member of St. Ferdinand Parish, where she and her husband are on the Strategic Planning Committee. She was previously a 20-year member of Good Shepherd Catholic Church in Evansville, where she served on the Parish Council and the Stewardship Commission and was a Eucharistic minister and lector.
H.E. “HERB” THYEN: Kimball International (Historical)
Herb was one of the original investors and part of the founding group of businessmen, in The Jasper Corporation, a precursor to Kimball International Inc. His early manufacturing technical proficiency centered around molded plywood and the specific products that such modernization enabled (water skis for example). Later he held down various administrative roles as Kimball grew, including legal and copyright oversight.
Perhaps one of the most enduring characteristics that Herb Thyen possessed was his undying pursuit of excellence through demanding and high-standards, necessary to assure success. Get it done, and get it done well, was the unrelenting standard he held himself and others to. A family man, Herb’s word was his bond and he was a respected member of the Jasper community.
Herb was also an innovative former mayor of Jasper, Indiana. Infantile polio was a real health threat in those days and the health community didn’t know for sure what was causing it. That was the impetus for Herb’s pollution-control push to reduce the fly population through requiring all Jasper homes to have garbage disposals in 1950. Originally founded in 1950 as The Jasper Corp., Kimball grew from a local company with less than 30 workers into an international corporation with about 9,500 employees. It employed some 3,200 locally. Kimball International, as it became known in 1974, made pianos, home and office furniture, television and audio cabinets, electronic assemblies, molded plastics, carbide cutting tools and metal stampings. It also produces lumber, plywood, processed wood materials and veneer.
Thyen served as a Democratic member of the Jasper City Council during the 1940s. When Mayor Charles Bartley died in office in 1945, Thyen assumed the role. He ran for mayor in 1948 and was elected to a full term. In 1950, he made news when Jasper became the world’s first community to require all its homes to have garbage disposals. He had pushed for the pollution-control measure.
He also was a world-champion trainer and shower of hackney ponies. Homing pigeons was another interest of Herb’s. He was a member of St. Joseph Catholic Church, Fourth Degree Knights of Columbus, Sorin Society of Notre Dame, St. Vincent DePaul Society, and a 50-year member of the Jasper Kiwanis. He was the recipient of the diocesan Brute Award, Sagamore of the Wabash, and Distinguished Service Award by the Lincoln Trail District Boy Scouts of America.
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