Mary Perkins running PR. She has admitted donning disguises and visiting Specsavers stores, posing as a customer. Perkins was made an honorary fellow of Cardiff University in 2005. The same year she received the "Rotary International Community and Vocational Service Award" for her services to charity and in 2006 won the inaugural Spirit of everywoman Award. Perkins was the first female optician in the UK to receive the title of Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in 2007. The accolade was also in recognition of her other charitable work, including the Guernsey annual "Specsavers Liberation Tea Dance for
Perkins Professorship of Astronomy and Mathematics Perkins Professorship of Astronomy and Mathematics The Perkins Professorship of Astronomy and Mathematics is an endowed professorship established at Harvard College in 1842 by James Perkins, Jr., (1761–1822). James Perkins, Jr., was a Boston philanthropist, benefactor of the Boston Athenæum, and co-founder with his younger brother Thomas Handasyd Perkins of the Perkins School for the Blind. In his will, Perkins left $20,000 to Harvard College to establish a chair in "whatever field the President and Fellows should find the most useful". The funds were transferred to Harvard on February 20, 1842, upon the death of Perkins' wife. At that time