This is a living history interview with Dean Ed Kohler, faculty at Georgia Tech between 1963 and 1999 and honorary alumnus of 1994, conducted by Marilyn Summers on June the 20th of the year 2001. 

We are at his home in Atlanta, Georgia, and the subject of our interview today is his life in general, his experiences at Georgia Tech. I'm going to call you Dean Ed, if that's okay. That's right. Leave the Kohler off. We both know who you are, right? 

That's right. We're so delighted that you'd let us come talk to you today. We had a hard time nailing you down. You're on the road all the time coming hither and yon. Me too, right? 

Right, right. Anyways, thank you so much for letting us come here today. 

Well, you're welcome. And I want to hear your whole story. Tell me where this all started. 

Well, me? 

Yeah, you. Me, little me, even. 

Yeah, where did you begin? 

Where were you born? 

Well, I was born in a little town of Emmaus, Pennsylvania. That's in north of Philadelphia, near Allentown. 

I mean, I was born in the Allentown Hospital, I lived on a farm, which my father had bought in 1910, and we lived in the new house on the patch, and that was built in 1804. And that was the new one? 

That was the new house. 

So we had a very well-established old farm. 

Right, and the old house was behind it, and it was built in the 1740s, and had, like in those old houses of Pennsylvania it was built of that field stone 18 inch walls and wonderful but the old one had in the had a basement and a main floor and a loft in the basement in the corners it had oblige shaped holes going through the wall so you could shoot out at the Indians but they couldn't shoot in with a straight shot so they shot with flaming arrows it would just bounce off the wall. 

So you really grew up steeped in history. That's right. Surrounded by it. With the gardens full of Indian arrowheads and things like that. Really? 

And was it an active farm? 

Yes. Your father was? 

He bought it to farm. He had moved there from only about 20 miles away in the Pennsylvania Dutch country. 

But he went to a normal school, a teacher's college, Kutztown Teachers College which was really the only kind there his father which was kind of unusual at the time there were seven kids in the family my dad was the oldest and any there were four four girls and three boys any who wanted to go to college he sent very unusual yeah and my father went and two of his sisters went so your grandfather was a great believer in education right And that passed down to your father. Right. And then he went to Penn State and got a degree in agriculture. 

So he was a professional farmer then. And after that he came back and he was a one-room country school teacher. Eight grades in a room type little country school. Your dad? 

Yes. 

So he was an amazing man wasn't he? 

He taught and farmed at the same time? 

Yes. Wow that's amazing isn't it? 

Right. And he kind of skipped a generation. He was born in 1887, and he didn't marry until 1930, 31, I think 1930. 

So he skipped that generation. He was an older father for you then. He was a nice old guy, but not a whole lot of fun. Not a whole lot. German men didn't tend to be a whole lot of fun. They brought a lot of the old country with them, didn't they, even if they were here all the time. 

But he was very nice and obviously well -educated, as was my mother. How many children did they have? 

There were three of us. I have two older sisters. 

So you were the baby boy. 

Okay, so your two older sisters came along and then you. 

Were you raised to think you would go on to higher education too? 

I mean, was education valued all the way around? 

Well, I always... nothing was said in terms of you must do this. 

But there was never any doubt in any of our minds that you went to school and you went beyond what would be the grade schools and high school. You did something. 

But it never said how you did that. It was just a feeling. It was a family value of mom and mom. You know, we knew my dad hadn't hit talk. My mother was a John Hopkins nurse and they just said, hey, you do this. How long did your father live? 

He died when I was 19, 1955. 

So he had a nice long life. He got a chance to see you succeed. 

Well, I was in the Army at the time. I was out of high school. I mean, it was not bad. 

So you grew up in a small town, actually out in the country. Out in the country. 

And you had to go into town for your elementary school? 

Well, there was a country school out of town. out of town. It was about a mile from home. Four rooms, eight grades, four teachers, two years in a room. That's the way it was probably. That's the way it was. Did you have a happy coming up? 

Oh yeah. I always wanted to leave, not because I didn't like it or didn't like my parents or something. I just wanted to go anywhere. 

You're telling me you were born with a very adventurous streak my mother when we were older and she'd sort of talk about things she says well I knew you had a 35 second run if it was longer than that you were gone she had 35 seconds she could still see me disappearing around the barn or the garage or something headed west over the she had that much time she had 35 seconds to run me down and that's just that you were gone Yeah. I'd say, where are you going? 

I'm going that way, you know. And you remember your life being that way, too. It's on the go all the time. Yeah. Full of fun. And when I was 18, after high school, I escaped. Wait, let's back up. Let's do high school. High school where? 

Emmaus High School. It's about two miles from home. The town was about, oh, 3,000 people. 

Everybody knew everybody, you knew everybody's business, right? 

What kind of a student were you? 

Average. I mean, I did all right. You didn't mind going to high school? 

Oh, no. No, that was wonderful. Were you into athletics? 

No, I wasn't into athletics. 

Well, one thing as a farm kid, in the spring and so forth, you were home plowing or something. And the one thing, I wanted to do something. 

And so my senior year, my parents said, okay, you can go out for track, which was sort of nondescript. 

But for four-year-old kids, it was all right, because you were always running and chasing rabbits. 

So you go out for track and run the mile with the pack. And how did you, so it was okay. Yeah. You obviously had the endurance to do that. Yeah. Oh, that wasn't the problem at all. 

If I had a little bit of coaching, I probably would have done fairly well. Fairly well. But, you know, it was fun, it was the thing. 

So finally you graduated from high school and you had to make a decision and it was the military. 

Did they make the decision by drafting you or did you enlist? 

At that time, in 1954, you were either going to go either enlist or be drafted. 

Well there's always a few around that didn't, you know, weren't going to college right afterwards or that so just a couple friends and I we just went and enlisted it was a little consternation I know to my dad because I didn't really tell him I mean I didn't really do it as a family decision well I'm gonna go see about it well it was even assumed that you did that any young men that were you know 18 to 22 year olds you knew you were going to do it the question was when or how and everyone was aware of the process well I just kind of went one day with to see about it and I just signed up yeah I can't you didn't come tell your dad first not before I did but I came home and said that's what I think my sister had said something said she she knew she said it wrong is my dad had asked she said well where's Eddie just well I think he went to Allentown she He said, what for you, he turned a list or something, something, something, she said, something as a matter of fact. 

So he was alerted to the fact that that's what you were about. He came home and he says, well, when are you going to leave? 

I said, Monday. But, you know, it was right around the 1st of July, right at the end of it. 

And that was going to be your first time away from home in a major way? 

Pretty much, yeah, except for maybe a 4-H camp or something. 

Do you think your dad thought you were going to take over the farm at some point in time? but I think he didn't really think that was you know what I know you well enough to know that wasn't going to be your thing no that wasn't and then he died just shortly thereafter yeah yeah well he was 68 I guess 68 69 years old and it it was not bad and he had he had had a couple of heart attacks he was really a very healthy strong person but he had he had come up at a time and he He lived by himself for many years, and being the school teacher and the person, he was always taking care of everybody, and you recall in the history of the 20s up around that part of the country they had this, it was like a pneumonia plague that went through that part and just thousands of people, 1917, right around the First World War II, and, well, Well, if you got, he was the one that would, they put caskets in the town square, and instead because of the funeral, no one would touch anybody, people were just getting, well, he'd help people bury their families and this kind of thing, well, he got sick, but he had no one to take care of him, and he almost died, he'd crawl out somehow and feed the animals once a day or two or something, and just keep going. 

But he had, I mean, he had some things happen to him. He also had polio as a kid and had messed up his leg. He really did come over some adversity, didn't he? 

Well, then he got drafted in World War I. 

And he served in World War I? 

He served, but he was on the way on the ship, and they finally realized that he wasn't kidding when he had really messed up a knee. He couldn't bend his one leg. And they still drafted him? 

They drafted him, yeah. 

And he served at the time, though, as a director of a big plantation farm in Virginia that raised food for the military. Oh, okay. 

So that was his assignment in 1917. 

So his farming was well -sticked in his bones, so to speak. Had he grown up on a farm? 

Oh, yes. 

So your granddaddy was still there, still in the family. Really? 

Yeah, since 1801. There's the Kohler Farm. Yes. In Pennsylvania. Yes. That's roots. Tell us about your military experience. 

Well I went around the 5th of July in 1954, a couple of weeks after I finished high school. And that was literally the first time off a farm more than a day or something. 

Remember we went to Philadelphia and they put us on a train and came down to this part of the country, to Fort Jackson for processing. I remember the second day in the Army, I was 17 hours on KPI. I thought, well, this is, you know, interesting. Hardly no word. 

And then we moved from there in a few days to Fort Gordon, it was Camp Gordon then for basic training. And it became acclimated to what Southern heat is like. And it said, join the Army, see the world. well you can do that but the root keeps snagging on the buttons of your shirt when you're crawling on it but it was a and i thought well all you had to do was put up with this guy with stripes on his arm you know being a real upset about stuff but it was nice walking around i wasn't as good a shape or better shape than they were trying to get you in when i went in so physically it was a piece of cake it was a piece of cake and uh you know and did you get you had chance to meet a lot of people from other walks of life. Oh yes. You found that interesting too? 

Oh very much so, very much so. 

What did the Army do with you? 

Well after that I went to some advanced training in engineer corps, they call it combat engineers where you build bridges and roads and then I went to Korea in January of 55 and that was after the war and I was there for almost 18 months. 

So was that part of like the cleanup? 

Yeah, after a war they always try to get it on paper, which is a great time to be in the zone because there's nothing, no one knows what's going on. Nobody knew what was happening. 

Right, and you're trying to find things and look for stuff and you had a lot of, in our case, in the units we were, you had a lot of free time. 

You could check out on Sundays, you could check out a military vehicle and go down to the beaches and up in the mountains and so you saw korea in a touristy kind of way then what kind of a country was it well except it had been beat up by i was in the south in pusan where the war wasn't fought there in seoul is where it was demolished pretty much by war but the the countryside is beautiful it's trees and things and old things I mean like thousand -year-old buildings and temples and the people and they got a chance to see it pretty good yes that was very that was very nice and the beaches are very very nice so the army delivered for you actually that's right they did let you see some of the world and I and then when I came back from there I was at Fort Belvoir Washington which was a good transition there was a and i always happened to be with people uh i mean army contemporaries people i lived with who were educated and you know college people and this kind of thing so it was a good influence yeah and they i mean the first time they took me to the symphony and the operands because you could get in washington you could get free tickets to buy anything you wanted to do or anything you could go to and i had a car i don't i got an old car and they get for say look i'll get a ticket if you take us if you'll drive us so you had a good social life I had a good social life and learned a lot of things and then it made the they say the paper transition to college a lot easier so you were able to go to college on the GI Bill yes which was in fact that was part of the that was part of the deal that was what I never I never expected or nothing was ever said at home about somebody else paying for college you did it I mean you were supposed to go and any way you could it was fine so you did the most logical way for the time really so you knew when you were coming out of the military you were going to enroll in school right and I'd already applied and really was accepted and you picked Penn State because well that was well that was the State University in Pennsylvania that's where you logically go if you were going to the state school did your mother keep the farm did she stay on you know she well she lived there for another 10 years or so and we had somebody just farm the field to keep the fields cultivated but it it was too much of a thing my sisters had gone into the nurses training and sort of lived there kind of but and and then in 1960 we sold essentially sold well the buildings part of the farm. We still have 33 acres left, my sisters and I have. Oh, do you? 

Well, that's good. Which is interesting because it's all surrounded by houses uptown. Oh, you're the little island in the middle of development, huh? 

This little island. Wow. And the people that live around said, oh, no, no, don't sell that. It's probably the only green space they can have. Because one of our high school buddies farms it. Keeps it going. Do you have the original houses, the two old houses? 

Well, the two old houses are still standing. The barn, which was built in 1809, it demised, it collapsed. It was too much to take. It just couldn't be kept up. The roof started leaking and it fell in. 

But the houses are still there. Yes. 

So you enrolled at Pennsylvania State, which is how far away from where you lived? 

Did you have to live on campus? 

Penn State is right in the middle of the and it's about a hundred thirty four so you had to be a resident oh yes and what was your college life like are you ready yes oh well I didn't think I was but of course I just come out of the army and a lot of these kids and I knew I wasn't a non-disciplined person but military is is good even if the stuff you do you don't like her might be bad but it's good in a general discipline way I mean you just learned to have to do some things and show up and get up and be there and this kind of thing. And that helped. Mm-hmm. 

And what we, well of course what I was worried of, okay, you're here, you're three years out of school, haven't opened a book or looked at a book or anything. 

Well, I did a little. When I was overseas, I took an English course from somewhere. I think University of Maryland had a big, they still do, big correspondence type of thing. And what we did was, well that was about it as far as doing learning stuff. 

But when I went there and you start going to class, like I guess any freshman going to class, I think, holy mark, here are these kids coming out of these high schools, you know, they're A's kids, you know, they jam up stuff. I said, I'll never make this. 

Well the difference you find out when you're in a situation like that is that the real bright young kids that didn't have to study or marginally if anything they they they have been told they're bright or they think they're very bright and they shouldn't have to they can just continue on well those distractions the other distractions are are so much that that some of them can't stand it well I knew or I had had learned that okay if you have an English theme or whatever it is a problem or two to do for homework or for something the next day, you've got to get it done. 

Okay, if you mess around or party until midnight or 1, you stay up until 3 or 4 and get it done. 

Well, some of those kids couldn't do that. You knew what all the options were. 

Well, you know, they'd fall asleep. And I just was amazed. 

The thing that was the most surprising to me about college, about the second semester, where two or three of these kids in in the hallway where I was living didn't we're not invited back let's put it that way watching the bright kids drop out simply because they didn't have the discipline yeah yeah I mean it wasn't anything with brains it was just a good couldn't do it oh yeah it'll get you and it said oh the fact they're still the same I haven't worked in it all those years the same same thing happens and we see the big fish come or the little Little fish, yeah, come to the big pond and turn into little fish in the big pond. Is that how that goes? 

Yeah, that happens. 

And then I did what the system was, I mean, the fraternity system, which was, oh, even at that time, much more one of the biggest ones in the country. I mean, every, there was like 57 fraternities, all but one or two nationals were on the campus. 

And it was a very organized system to get around and see, and I thought, well, you know, I'd go around and look at anything, see what. 

Well bottom line was I did become affiliated and join at the end of my freshman year for the sophomore year. 

And the sophomore year I moved into the fraternity house and became very active and in fact I did that kind of work for about nine or ten years. And you never dreamed it was going to be a career for you at the time? 

No, no. 

But it was a very positive thing. 

In fact, the same group, it just, maybe it's unusual, maybe it isn't, I don't know why it should be, but some of the groups that we started just having like in college, New Year's parties and this kind of thing, we're still having it. 45 years later, every New Year's we go to this guy's house. Isn't that amazing? 

You know, 10 or 20, 30 people. And it's that. 

So you made really firm relationships, fast relationships. We still are getting together. What were you studying in school? 

What was your degree going to be in? 

I was taking liberal arts. I didn't know. I mean, I thought, well, okay. 

So I was in the liberal arts school, kind of general arts and sciences. And I remember the comments from my mother on through everywhere. She said, well, what can you do with that? 

I said, I can do anything. I can do anything. I said, well, I'm not going there to learn a trade. 

I said I know how to fix cars and farm I could do that and that at that time maybe you you could much better do that but uh it was it was a very good move just a broad education right right in the humanities and whatnot mm-hmm and how many years did it take you to get your undergraduate degree for right and graduation rolled around right and how did the decision get made what you were going to do for a career? 

Well, the next step, I was, I say I was very active in, I was president of the House and I knew, just through that I got acquainted with some people nationally and other things. I'd been to a few conventions and different types of things. We didn't say what the name of the fraternity was. Acacia. Acacia. A-C-A-C -I-A. It's a word. It's, you know, your mainline fraternity, it's the first one on the list of them. It's a word instead of letters, just letters, right. And so at the time they were looking for a person to work for the national office. And basically I interviewed and got the job. 

So before I really graduated, or not much before, but I knew that's what I was going to do, I had the job. 

And you were going to be a field representative? field representative you travel the chapters at colleges all all over the United States or wherever you have them you were going to see some of the world I did and I though I used that as an excuse I milked that one to death I'd use it in the arm and said well I better go do something because when I ever get a job I'll be set somewhere and have to do that well in fact in in college and between my junior and senior year I decided well I don't know when I get senior you get a job and you'll be stuck at a certain place I better take it take a trip so I took whatever I think young person thinks would be kind of interesting what I call a bum's holiday I got an old car and and I at the end of finals week my junior year I headed for California and West I thought well we'll just go and what I thought well to make sure I got out there I put a sign on the bulletin board says headed for Los Angeles you know just share gas money I'll take you there. 

So there's four people out there. It actually didn't cost me anything to get there. And I had some Army buddies and some other acquaintances here and there. 

So we got out to California. I spent about almost 90 days just traveling the country. Wow. 

Seeing California, huh? 

Well, not just California, but I went from there up to San Francisco and to Salt Lake in Wyoming and wherever and doing things. I kept a diary and the whole thing ended up costing about $180. Wow, that's great. And I did everything. I mean, I felt confident in doing stuff. 

If you get into a little town, you always go to the little park and stand there and look up and look like somebody with civic pride will come by and say, well, can to help you look lost. I said, well, I've never been here. This is kind of interesting. He said, well, what are you doing? 

And they'd tell him. 

And most, especially men say, at that point, maybe 40 years old, would say, you know, I always wanted to do that. Just take a trip around the country. And then, you know, you get married, you get a job. 

So you were living everyone's dream. 

They'd say, well, where are you staying? 

And I had one of these old Nash automobiles that the insides folded flat. 

And you could literally, I mean, we were made to do that be a camp car and uh they'd say well look we got a bunk and why don't you come on me on you were charles corot ahead of the time out of 180 days i was gone just about 100 100 some days just you know summer three months yeah but around 100 days i think i slept in the car two times you're kidding you were able to Codon your way up everything else that's right and then you know If I was running out of money out in the country in a farm, you could pull up to a farm and just tell people what you're doing and say, look, I'm around the farm, there's work to do. I said, look, I can tune up your tractor, put your fence posts in, or do something. All I want is a tank of gas. Oh, heck, you can handle that. 

So they were able to give you gas, food, lodges, whatever, you barbed your way. 

How much fun was that? and you met tons of neat people probably oh yes that sounds like everybody's trade that's right and then of course when I came back that was in my senior year when this thing with the fraternity so it came through well that was more trial I had the like the United States was my territory so I your mother was probably saying oh that Ed that's what we would have expected of him going everywhere That's right. And you stayed with Acacia for how long? 

I did that a little over two years. I was going to stay a little longer, but that's when I ran into Jim Dull. He was on the prowl for somebody to do what I was doing traveling at one place at Georgia Tech. He was looking for a fraternity advisor. Right. To work with him. 

And where did you meet him? 

Where did that meeting take place? 

He went, that was totally, just stumble, it's, well, one of the philosophy things everyone should develop, say, look, it's not so much what you know, it's who you know and who you meet. 

Well, the more street corners you're standing on, the better chance you'll meet somebody that comes by that's useful or would be interesting or helpful to know. 

There was a conference of student personnel type people, student affairs people that was meeting at Northwestern University in Chicago and our office was right down the street from there. 

Well there was a person who had done a few years before what I was doing that was the Dean of Men or something at Purdue and was a fraternity brother. 

So I was sent up to say, see if you can go find this guy and let's see if we can get together for dinner. And I said, okay, I'll do that. 

So I went up, and they were meeting in classroom buildings, using rooms there, and I was walking around kind of looking in windows and doors and this kind of thing, and it's one of these character people you'll never forget in your life, but was sitting in a hallway at a card table, and he had just a yellow pad, and he was a funny, engaging guy. 

I mean, just a humorous sort of fellow, I mean, very, very nice, but, and I said, what are you doing? 

Sitting here in the hallway. He says, I'm taking names. I said, oh, you are? 

I said, well, I have a name. 

Do you want my name? 

And he said, yeah, what is your name? 

And I, you know, I, we were gassing a little bit. 

He said, no, I said, what I'm doing is I'm taking names of people who are interested in this field because there's people that are looking for people and people looking to work. And this was sort of the rudimentary placement system, very rudimentary placement system. Yeah, very basic. Okay. 

Well, so I just said, well, yeah, I'm thinking about doing that when I get done doing what I'm doing here. 

So I just wrote my name and phone number on this yellow pad. 

Well, I found the guy I was looking for, and I went back down, just about two blocks, and walked back down to my office. 

I wasn't back, and the phone was running, and the guy said, hey, who is Jim Dahl? 

I said, I have no clue who Jim Dunn is. He said, well, he wants to see you. And he says, you know, okay. 

And they were having a reception that night for the people that had come to this conference at one of the, there was another fraternity headquarters, SAE was in Evanston, and they were hosting a reception for those people coming to this thing. There were a lot of people there that they worked with. got college and fraternity people and he said he'd be there we don't want to come up and look him up and that we were going anyway so I said yeah okay so I did and I found him and he said well what are you doing after you finish this stuff I said well I don't know I was thinking of doing that but I'm sort of obligated to it was in the summer and start another year I said I would I said And I feel obligated to do that, he says, well, why don't you come, we have this position at Georgia Tech. Had you ever heard of Georgia Tech before? 

Oh, yeah. I said, you mean Ramblin'' Ruck from Georgia Tech? 

I said, yes. I've never been there, but I know what it is, assume it's there. And he said, well, why don't you come down and see, why don't you come down and see. And then he went through the thing, you know, how to take it. 

He said, well, look, if you're offered to come, if there's a position open and you're offered to interview for it and you come, they'll pay your expenses to come and do this, if they offer you the job and you take it. If they offer you a job and you don't take it, you're on your own. 

Well, I mean, that's all right. I said, well, look, that's not a problem. I'll tell you what I'll do. He said, I'll just drive down there. I've never been there. and I got a couple days vacation I'll just come down and see what what's going on so it was totally serendipitous you're saying correct yes just happened to be there just happened to be there that's right and it changed your life right Dean Kohler tell me your first impression of tech you got in your car and you drove down I got in my car I drove down yes I did and and Jim Dahl said he says well don't worry about a place to stay you can stay with us you know he He lived on a campus in a little house right on the corner of 5th and, well across from the, is it CE or, it's right on the corner of 5th and near the CE building. Fowler, oh overmore. No, it's up a little higher at the top of the hill. That's right, it was just one of those small houses that was there. That's long gone now? 

That's long gone now. 

So he and Gay just made you comfortable to stay with him? 

Well, I think everything was done in a real small town way in those days, huh? 

Right. 

And, you know, and the staff that was around, they became, we had a cookout, you know, in our backyard just making hot dogs and stuff, and he took me around just showing me different things, and there were some students there and some of the fraternities, and we just walked around and did things, and he was telling me, this is something you should do. they said you're going to do this anyway. 

Well, the thing, I had, of course I had been traveling the country, I had been to colleges from Seattle to, you know, to Florida to New England to San Diego, and I knew what was there and what these jobs were like and kind of what the progression was. 

And it was very obvious, this was one where you were making about a couple of leaps at the first job, even though this job was, yes it was fraternity advisor, but it was on the dean of student staff. It was one of the, and there were not that many people working there. 

So you knew you were going to have opportunities. You were going to have a lot of things to do. 

What did you think of the campus and the look? 

Was it appealing to you? 

Well it was very much, one of the things that you learn when you just visit a lot of campuses some campuses are our school mills and some are our places or show places or this kind of thing but Georgia Tech is one of the places much like Penn State was it's a very much a alumni friendly place it's a place that you you want to be an alumnus from if you get there often there's some history or tradition in the family or something and it's a place that things go on and their experiences are there that you will take and carry with you and remember it's a place like that. You saw it as a place that changed you, that molded you, that shaped you. It's a place like that. 

Well, the difference is people that go there are a little bit different. I mean not in any kind of negative way, in a very positive way. It's a family. they're just going to do this now you and as you well know from being here the time you have some people come and they don't ever want to leave that's not particularly good I mean students and when we all know the seven eight nine year students that just get in the groove they just get in the groove and some of them graduate some of them don't but it's but it's a very much of a place like that and that's that's nice I mean if you have a feel for colleges that's a very positive thing. 

And that struck you just in these couple days you were there, that this was a good place to be? 

Right. 

So how long did it take you to make up your mind? 

Well, of course, Jim was needing somebody. He was, he was, you know, when he gets on a case, he kind of... You were pressured. And I wasn't, of course, I wasn't used to, I'd never met him before. I didn't know what it was. 

But then it thought, when he made an offer and said this, and I talked to my guy said look I said I think I really should do this because this is something I've had in mind doing next anyway and I don't think I would have the chance of getting a situation that is this this good out of the box so I really think I'd better take it out you know and I talked to him about timing and you know to make the transition so that I wouldn't leave them in a total lurch and doing some things which which I did and then I did that time was made to come in September of 63 and down you move bag and baggage to Atlanta well I could everything I owned I had in my car I didn't I never live fluid huh right when I when I was traveling for the fraternity I was just out I wasn't going back and forth to someplace I'd be going from Philadelphia to Minneapolis to Seattle to San Jose to San Diego so you pretty much had everything right with you. I had everything I needed with me. And here you were living in Atlanta, Georgia. Right. 

And where did you move to first? 

What was your first resident? 

Well it was the one, it was the Resident Advisory Department in Smith, Smith Dorm, right across from the Varshee, right on that, on that corner. It's a very, it's a very nice apartment. It still uses staff apartments. 

They were made for that, but it's a, it's a two bedroom, big living room with fireplace, park gate floors. Really? 

I had no idea it was so grand. It's a nice, in fact Miller lived there for about 10 or 15 years. 

So they were pretty good digs for you then? 

They are. That part of Fields. 

Well on each of those corners in that block there's an apartment like that for staff in those residence halls and they're very nice. Walk to work? 

Walk to work. Where would you keep your car? 

Well there was a garage down in the back that we had. Even garage, a lot of perks with this. 

Well, it was good and bad. And you could smell the varsity if you opened the window. It had a limited storage place up in the attic. 

There's an attic up in the top of the residence hall that had literally unlimited space, which is good and bad because you just put stuff up there. How many years did you live there? 

Six years. Six years. Right. And I got married a year after I came. 

Now, how did you meet your wife? 

Well, when I was traveling with a fraternity, she was at the University of Illinois. And she was the social chairman of her sorority. And when I visited the guys in the fraternity house, that's one of those things you never forget. It was the middle of the week. I would go to two or three places a week, depending on geography. And they said, hey, you want a date while you're here? 

I said, well, no, I'm leaving tomorrow. You know, and I'm off. That's not a bit. 

Well, you know, we have nice girls here. I said, I'm sure you do. I said, that's not anything to do with anything. And I just bought myself another car. It was a red convertible, a red Chevy Impala convertible. Wow. It was a very nice car. Hot car. It was a very nice automobile. And I said to this guy, I said, well, don't worry about it. 

And they had, after supper of the night, they had like a co-ed softball league where it was being, you know, it was kind of a hoot, you know, you'd all go play ball and whoever the winner, it didn't matter, whoever the won or lose, and you all go out down to the joint and party a little bit. 

Well, I mean it was a fun thing. There was a lot of people there. And he came in and said, look, I got you a date with a Kappa social chairman. He said you would come by about whatever it was, 7.30 or 8 something. 

I said, oh, why am I doing that? 

And I thought, well, he'd set up something and they'd do things together. there. 

So if they did something and someone didn't show up, it looked like a joke. 

I remember every college had a little different system in sorority houses, how to find people, call people when you go in or if there's a buzzer system or phones or however you do it. 

I remember them saying, there's a little booth in there and it has little Morse code dots and stuff on the wall and you push these and you know it rings in rooms or does something whatever it was. I said okay. 

So I went in there and I remember there was some other person in the hallway and I said okay and I said, I've never been here, how do you do this? 

She said, well who are you looking for? 

And I told her, I said, Ellie, he said, oh well, here, she said, I'll tell her somebody is here. 

She said, what's your name? 

I said, well, I remember she comes running down the stairs and says, oh, hi, how are you doing, whatever. And I said, well, look, let's go out. 

I mean, they said, take me someplace around here, some joint where students go and tell me what's going on. We'll never forget. She said, oh, let's go out to Jolly Roger. I said, it's a place right out in here. 

Well, she got me lost, going to this place. She didn't know where it was? 

Well, she did, but she didn't. Okay. She said, I never pay any attention, you know, going. I'm almost riding with somebody and never. 

But anyway, we did find it. I'll never forget. She had on a, it was a blue dress and she got it caught in the latch of the door. Oh, no. And it didn't, it didn't, it put a little grease spot on it. It didn't really tear it. It just put a little tear down on the bottom, which was kind of a, kind of a joke. and I took her. Anyway, we had a nice time and I was leaving the next day. Hey, you know, great. It's where to live. What are you doing? 

What are you taking? 

Such as that. And she lived in Elgin, Illinois, which is west of Chicago, about 40 miles. 

And I was working out of Evanston, you know, which was, and I thought, well, it'd be interesting, you know, if she's around there in the summer, maybe we'll date. 

So you took her phone number? 

Well, I didn't know. I didn't even take her phone number but I did write her name in my book though. What good was that if there was no phone number? 

Well, no, you can find people. 

So anyway, I have, okay, fast forward a couple months, I'm back in Chicago for a couple months in the summer and one weekend I went up to Wisconsin to visit, it was an army buddy I had that lived up there on a farm and coming back, coming back through the country and there was a sign said you know elgin and i thought elgin that's where that girl is i'll just drive i'll just drive in and look in the phone book because her last name is hagelow there is there is no other one in the world there is no other one you know and it was one it's easy kind of easy to remember but i stopped at a gas station looked in the phone book and called the number and uh she answered she answered the phone and i said hey i said this is that guy for a minute he said oh yeah how you doing? 

I said, well look, I'm just going back to Chicago. I was coming back from Wisconsin. And I thought, hey, I was going to stop by and see you for a minute. And she said, well look, come on over. I'm only half a mile from where you are. 

But she said, I got to leave in about an hour. I'm going to a wedding of one of my high school buddies that's getting married. 

But she'd come on by. 

Well, I did. And I met her parents and this kind of thing. and I said, well, let's go out sometime, or I'll come out, which is fine. That was the beginning of the courtship, huh? 

Yeah. 

And, well, the interesting thing is I did, we did date then that summer, but then she went back for her senior year at Illinois. 

I went back on the road, and I saw her about three times when we passed through there, and when I then I got that job down here did you let her know ahead of time you were moving permanently to Atlanta well yeah well you know she knew that I mean or I did yeah I did well her father didn't think what I was doing running around the country was was the thing to do he didn't think that was a real job You know, he came up through the Depression and he was very successful, he had a jewelry store and was, you know, this was, anyway, that was kind of funny. 

Well then, of course, I came down here, she finished her college and she went to Europe for two months with a girlfriend of hers, a sorority sister of hers, they went to Europe. and that's the time I got the job done here while they were overseas and you know they came back and I was about ready to be gone well the deal she made with their parents said they didn't care what she did when but she was she they had struggled and made that she could go to college and she's going to work one year she was an elementary education and she lived at home and did she taught for one year in Nelson Illinois and this kind of thing well while she was going I was down here she's up there and we're dating I used to drive up there on the weekends you're kidding okay which was you know next thing to insane I guess yeah long distance relationships well the interstates weren't done that and it you spent the whole weekend in the road well it took about 15 and a half hours and I'd I'd leave here three or four o 'clock Friday afternoon or something get up there at six o'clock in the morning. I said, but this time you were in love. You were running on adrenaline or something. Yeah, you were in love. 

Well, it got to be when I started doing that, I mean, I didn't do it every weekend, but I was doing it regularly enough, and I thought, geez, you know, I better make a move or quit this. Marry this girl. Yeah, yeah. Someday you're going to fall asleep or something. It was getting very risky, huh? 

Yeah, so we better start putting Plan 2 into effect. or something. Which we did. And then... Did you get married up in Elgin? 

Yes. And then you brought her back to Georgia Tech. Brought her back to Georgia Tech. She visited a couple of times. Jim and Gabe were real good. As soon as they knew, in fact, we were dating, they said, well, get her down here. Get her down here for homecoming. Get her down here. Show her this around. And she came a couple of times and she'd stay with other people. It was fun, she worked, it was really enjoyable. And the interesting, when we moved into that dorm, of course we lived there five years, married. Our first son was born there about three years into it. It was kind of interesting because there were 325 freshmen, guys, who lived in the dorm. And Ellie. And Ellie. She's the one I should be interviewing, right? 

That's right. is, it was, and of course, the first time she came, they were, she was just out of college and whatnot, and here, there, these guys were calling her Mrs. Kohler, and she said, oh, geez, you know. She was the same age as that. That's right. 

Well, the things, when our son was born, or about to be born, they were just sitting on, the guys were sitting on pins and needles, you know, they. Everybody got involved in your paternity. They got involved. 

Well, when that day came, I remember on North Avenue, they had, in the windows, going down the streets, it's a boy. Oh, everybody was a part of that baby. What did we name our first boy? 

Phillip. Phillip, okay. 

So he was highly regarded by the whole crew. Oh yeah, and we had some built-in babysitter types. I bet you did. 

In fact, because it was like, you know, especially when we didn't go out for like an hour or two, and they all had to do is someone sit there, you know, be sleeping. 

But the guys would just love to come down to have a place to spread out a book and eat and do something like that and so that worked out and then when he got to crawling which set him on the end of the hallway and he knew I mean all they were like uncles you know guys he crawled down the hallway to the door he wanted to visit I think that's funny it was a great place for the kid to grow up there it was lots of people looking out for them. It was very good. Meanwhile, you had cemented a pretty good relationship with Dean Dolf. Yes. You and Jim were getting along great, and you were enjoying what you had done. You had done the right thing? 

Yes, yes, very much so. 

But again, it was after five years, and I had sort of intimated and said something, hey, look, this isn't something you do forever. Yeah. 

So where do I go from here? 

And I, well, I mean, at that time, this was the late 60s, and so there was a lot of jobs like that around the country, And, of course, I had developed a lot of contacts and was starting to just nose around to say, okay, what should I do next? 

And Jim would say, oh, well, no, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, you know, don't go yet. There's things going on. And that's the time we had just started to organize the building of the Student Center. Yeah, up to that time, the Y, the YAMCA was the Student Center. And, of course, it was woefully outgrown. too much too many kids not enough going on yeah and so the campaign the dollar campaign had started to build the student center right and um there was you and freddie when and dean dole right who else was behind all that who do you remember from those days well dean dole that the was it was it odk or uh you know one of the group was really and they had worked on it for like 25 years i mean it wasn't like yeah no it didn't just happen the last but it was finally coming to the point where there was going to be a student center. And Jim Dahl was really pushing that as a thing. I mean, it's just something you needed to have. It wasn't like building the bigger YMCA. It had to happen. A student center at a major university is something you need to have. It had to happen. It had to happen, right. And so they built the work. And its time was coming. Right. And how much influence did you have on the building? 

Very, very little. They hired a director first before they, you know. Promoted you to that. No, I wasn't a director. 

No, they hired a person to come in and help in the design to build, to design it, staff it, and have it set in there. Who was that? 

The first one was a guy named Jim Thomas. He had been, I think, from Wayne State or somewhere. 

Who actually designed the building? 

Who were the architects? 

Was it somebody on campus? 

Well, they had a part in it. I mean, it was sort of a list of things you wanted to have and then you'd look at square footage. I mean, it wasn't done as a picture and then how are we going to use it. 

It wasn't say, okay, build a nice country club looking place and then we'll figure out how we use the rooms. It was done functionally, okay, these are functions we want to have in this facility. What year did it actually begin? 

Well, it opened in August of 1970. 

Okay, but when did they actually start construction? 

It was about two years before that. 

So in 68? 

Yeah, 68, 69. 

Okay, so you've been on the campus five years. Yeah. And you were interested in, you saw the need for this. Right, right. 

Well, it was also an ongoing thing. It was one of Jim's projects. It was going to happen. And plus the others, too. There was a student movement, like Fred Wins and I think Paul Mayer. there were some faculty, and there was an argument to have it. It was a question of how to fund it. I mean that, especially there was not a high priority item. 

And wasn't it one of the first major buildings on that side of the campus? 

Oh yeah, there was all little houses over there when that first started to be built. Jamie Anthony had started buying up all those little houses a long time before that. 

In fact, if you walk from the Student Center toward the library, now you come out and walk in that direction, right on that corner, which was the extension of Hemphill Avenue, there was a street that just went through there, but right on that corner was a liquor store. And it was there until they built the Student Center. I mean, until the thing was built. Really? 

I didn't know that. It was on Hemphill then? 

Yeah, right. Yeah. 

Yeah, and in fact when they first opened that there was still traffic on there and a couple people got hit when they first got into that. And see the bookstore part wasn't there at the time, that was added a little later. 

But no, that was just the little houses across there. And this big building put into it. And then that was the first one of that going that direction. 

So then when it was under construction, the first director left, he resigned to do something else, we hired another director, that was Tim Mitchell. 

He was the one that finished the design, they did a bunch of change orders and moved some stuff around which you get to expect but then also he was responsible for staffing it, training it and opening it. And I came when he came in 1969. That's when I got the job as assistant or social director and went with that group. 

And your job was to help facilitate that and Yeah, to facilitate that, to get, yeah, to facilitate the staff it, organize it and get it open and run it. 

What's your clearest memory of that time? 

Well, it was kind of interesting because any of us, Tim Mitchell's philosophy of staff was, everyone needs to know how this place works. 

So everybody needed to know how the big dishwasher that looks like a freight car runs and where the mops and brooms are kicked, and where, I mean, you can all get in a coat and tie and shake hands with people, but, you know, things have to happen. 

But we were around there hanging drapes until 2 or 3 in the morning that day before it opened. I'll never forget that. You can remember it. August 6, 1970, you know, and we opened the door scared to death to see what. What was going to happen? 

Yeah. We were opening the door to the student body. Right. They were saying you can come in. open the door and then we had there was all kind of food service we were operating all of that as a staff I mean that was that wasn't contract work or oh it started up full steam you didn't gradually add things no Wow no it opened was there not a RA or somebody no no no no it was Georgia Tech that's right you had to hire cooks and stuff like that yeah yeah we had everything cooks and cashiers and the food service people were all working with us and then that plus the program things I mean the things that happened as organizations and rooms and events and programs and concerts and lectures and that whole all of that was you weren't replacing something you were doing something for the first time and expectations were high they They were very high and it was important not to just stumble on yourself. 

What were some of the programs that were offered initially? 

I mean, did you guys have like a grand opening or something? 

Oh, we had, well, there were some dedications, some grand openings, some real nice banquets because they wanted to essentially show off the food service. 

An interesting person, the food service director was that person that had worked with the director at Eastern Illinois. 

But he was ex-military, interesting, but he had been in World War II and Korea. 

But he was a real food service person. 

And he'd look at something and he'd go out in restaurants and say, I wouldn't serve this to the troops in Korea. 

So he knew the logistics of it and knew how to get out a big... And the guy, he had been a prisoner of the Bataan Death March. Really? 

A survivor of that. And he had gone, but he was good. I mean, he was good in organizing the food service and doing things right and nice and well. 

So what was the initial response? 

It was very good. 

So they were singing the praises? 

Oh, yes. Yes, yes. Even the cynical students came in. 

Yeah, well the thing is there was always the sense of why you want a craft shop, geez, you know, text you to an art gallery, geez, you know, well you had art programs, you had shows passing through, you had gallery things, you know, so that was a lot of it was just new stuff. 

And the criticism of whatever there was it wasn't because of what you were doing, I mean it wasn't like this is this is awful but the important thing as we were taught and shown and made to do whatever you did it was not going to be done poorly I mean some things are well received some things may not be all right that's fine but it'll be done well the event or the show or the project or the class or whatever it is going to be as good as there was to happen so were you happy with that? 

Oh yes, oh yes. A lot of satisfaction in that work. Right, right. And then that's evolved since in many kind of ways. 

At the time that the Student Center opened, that marked a big change with the relationship with the Y. 

Because up to that time, or part of that time, the Y was getting some of the student monies and what not, and the decision was made to cut that off clean, it would become a separate entity, and student services would, you know, funding would go directly to the institute, not anymore with the Y. 

What is your recollection of that? 

Well, that, it's a function of fees, and that system, I guess, is still there to some degree. Student activity fees really support things like the student center and the athletic complex. 

Well, a big issue I had read was that the separation of church and state, they felt like the Y was, do you remember anything about that? 

No, no, not really. That wasn't the thing. 

It was a question of, well, there were some politics and tradition and history and whatnot, but again, there wasn't a facility. In fact, the Y initially, there was a fairly large suite of space in the student center for the Y. Oh, was there initially? 

Right. now they didn't I think they initially occupy but then they didn't that they got another place you know though they didn't stay there I mean that but there was that was a very beginning it was going to be there was designed into it to have them there but as a sort of a larger student organization I mean like there are the big ones like the athletic complex and publications I mean the bigger major and the student center itself or major big organizations well it was going to be you know a fairly and they they have they continued to get some activity fee funding the Y the Y did for program they may still I don't know but probably not maybe no I don't think you know anymore but they did initially and there was three or four people that worked on their staff so So they were going to tear down the building, the Y building at that time. Oh, yeah. Thank God somebody saved us and we wouldn't have a home. That's right. Yeah, that was interesting and that was nice. 

So the Center of Student Activity moved from North Avenue over to the West Campus, which was a big, big change. Right. A grown-up change for the Institute to make, right? 

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Let's go back and talk. now but this time you were your assistant director of that associate director of the student center right now what was your next move up from that well that time uh uh gene nichols who was the associate dean of students had had been you know the time i was there he he got a position at brunswick junior college as dean of students and he which was i mean it just happened also i I mean, he wasn't particularly planning, or even Jim or I didn't know, it was just something that came up. He loved boats, he loved the ocean, he loved water, he loved those opportunities, and he took it. 

Well, that made that position open. And I didn't know, well, I mean, I didn't have any claim to it, or anything like that. But, I mean, things just worked out in those next few months that I got into that position. And that's basically where I, that was 1972. 

Okay, so before that, your second son had been born. 

He moved, yeah, the day we moved out of the residence hall to our first little house over near Lanarkes off of Waiuka Road. He was born a week after we moved. And his name is? 

Eric. Okay. 

So you had the two boys, and you were well-established in Atlanta by this time, and you became the Assistant Dean? 

Associate Dean of Students. Still working with Jim Doe? 

Yes. You two were a team by this time, for sure. That's right. 

Well, what did your new responsibilities entail? 

What did you have to do? 

What was different? 

Well, okay, I moved from the Student Center, which was a building and a program function of a new entity at the school, okay. 

So, okay, I moved back with Jim in the administrative office of Dean of Students. 

Which was where then? 

Well, it was up in the old building where we were, the old Dean of Students building up on the top of the hill where the, what is it, Minority Education is there now? 

Chapin. Chapin, Chapin. Right. Right. We never heard of that name until it went up. Who is this guy? 

Somebody came to him. That's right. Somebody got... It was originally the Whitehead building, the infirmary, to start with. I think it may have been the Chafin to start with. Chafin was, evidently, somebody had to do with student life or something. Back when it was built, it was Whitehead. The Whitehead, that's right. And it had that part in the back was the solarium, the sanitarium. Yeah, because it was the infirmary. That's right. That's where the kids came for their aches and pains. That's right. And then that's where they came for aches and pains when you two were running roost as deed. That's right. And then well in 56, 57 they built a new infirmary over where it now is. In that period of time, when you first came to the campus, Harrison was president? 

Correct. By the time you came there. Did you get to know him at all? 

Yes. Somewhat. And have since. I mean we've seen each other. You stay in touch with him somewhat. 

How would you describe his administrative style on the campus at that time? 

Well, almost any major administrator from anywhere was a military officer or something, most of them from World War II. As Van Leer had been. As Van Leer had been and as others, and they were Navy people or Academy people or something. and well it was predictable and of course almost really almost everybody else that worked there was a some kind of a soldier drafted or otherwise so we were highly organized so you're telling us so you you weren't i mean that's stuff fit i mean it it you know you were predictable you could understand whatever style they were using you could understand it it wasn't necessarily agree with him. 

But he was a, I mean there were some, I remember some administrative and academic battles, he was fighting and fuming and what not. I was fairly much immune from those. I was down enough in the functioning level where, you know, those were Jim's battle to fight. Yeah, and it didn't impact you. 

After he left, Hanson came in, just briefly, and then we had some acting, and that was when Vernon Crawford, and you got to know all of those people fairly well too. And then Pettit came. And Pettit was a different type altogether. 

Did you ever get to know him? 

Well, we did, and just that we did many things that involve that love and he not not so much I mean events and places and things we knew who each other were I didn't I didn't work say with him a lot of his with his staff people I mean there were a lot of projects we mean everything from budgets to buildings to things that involved but it definitely brought change oh yeah the focus on research and a definite change you saw the campus taking a different right tendency right that that's when that I guess that into research that's where you know that went to get from I guess I don't know what's from teaching to research but where they were going to make the mix yeah big time and I guess they haven't they do and they did they well so some people's you know frustration I guess but that's that's a that's life things change Dean Ed when we think about the time you spent at Georgia Tech some of the real old characters were still around people like Dean Griffin and did you get to know him fairly well well yes I did well Dean Dean Griffin was entitled the Dean of Students when I came in 1963. He I think officially retired in 64 sometime, but he was the Dean of Students. Do you remember the first time you met him? 

Oh yeah. Oh yeah. 

He was going to that big office area that he had and the whole room was pegboarded with thousand pictures of everything from everywhere and anybody. 

And he was very nice, but he was this gruff kind of guy, he'd look at the floor and lecture you and you know he'd be doing three things while he's talking to you and you're looking around well does he mean, is he talking to me or is he somebody else? 

Some of this kind of thing. 

And one of the things I remember when I first came, it was that first fall, he was having some little event for the staff or something at his home, at his house out on Longwood, which is right out Northside Drive, it was just close to campus, and I remember I asked him, I said, well, what should you wear, or, you know, and he said, well, it's a casual thing. well casual to an old southern gentleman and casual to somebody now it means a whole lot you're not talking tank tops and flip-flops you know you're talking I say well that means maybe you maybe you're not might not wear your coat the whole time you're there but you'd have a shirt and a tie and you want to be sure and I yes I remember that that kind of thing and I'm also when when my wife came down and of course she was just out of college herself. 

And that's the time, over on 10th Street was a lot of the grocery stores and 5th and 10th, that's where we went over to do shopping. 

One day or soon after we were married, she goes over there and there's Dean Griffin in the store and she runs into him. 

And she had on her Bermudas and she's going, She said, what's he going to think, you know, I look like a waif from somewhere, you know. 

And of course, wherever he was, in the grocery store, he takes her by the arm and walks her over to the cashiers and the man, you know, he knows that whether he knew him or not. He talked to everybody like he did. I want you to meet this little Yankee girl here that just came down and, you know. He paraded her around. He paraded her around. 

So he was very, very friendly, is the question about that. oh yeah oh yeah there's a lot of dean griffin stories goodness knows oh yeah well you can't now of course he was there so long doing them and at a period of time see the the the difference was he was sort of a one-man band to that whole area of the of the school he was whatever a student need or some activity was that that had to be done he was really the only person there there was a few people that worked around him I mean but not not that many he was the only word in the final it was a final word yeah how about Dorothy Crosland well she okay she was the director of libraries and I guess that the history of her I didn't I didn't know I wasn't there when she came up through the ranks but she had been there I someone as a clerk I guess 1926 right but I mean she was one of the few women that worked at all I mean on the campus as a as either a super secretary or some assistant and really kind of evolved through there I mean through I'm sure some hard work and maybe some from pushing or promotion from somehow, but she just evolved as the queen bee of the library and as such I guess even the guys are made, not the guys, let's say some faculty or the administration and maybe through their wives or something said look you need, you know when you're going to decorate this office you're going to have somebody that knows what a fabric is or what a color is or that does that and I think she pretty much evolved into doing that kind of thing. Oh yeah, she was an interior decorator. Where she was the designer decorator of things like that. 

How do you remember her? 

Well, as a, I guess a southern lady and to a guy from Pennsylvania and what not, this southern thing is something you you you learn by seeing one I imagine that's one of those and she definitely was one of those that's one of those and I remember she when you when you hear her talk she had kind of this it was a little low voice it was kind of a southern lady voice but it kind of she groaned and had a low pitch to it was it's it's too bad there aren't recordings of her she had a distinctive sound right and and and some and some mannerisms and some words but it wasn't totally unique to her it was just that that she was she possessed those qualities that other women had and I think it's a way that probably when she was schooled that she learned that was the old southern way and she was a great example of that for sure and she ran with an iron hand that's right that's mess with her library she retired shortly after the student center opened but she was here when the student center opened saw a lot of change at Georgia Tech oh yes that's right how about the wreck tell me about that it coming on the campus do you remember that coming well I it was it was here not long well Jim Dahl had found it really on the park on the street and And eventually connived it so it got donated. Yeah, it came there. 

Well, I have an interest, you know, say I have a Model T myself, and I just have an interest in cars, something I do and did always have. 

Well, usually they needed somebody who needed to be concerned just about upkeep and maintenance. 

And just seeing it, I was just always interested, hey, who does this, who makes sure that, you know, the oil is checked and the thing that has brakes and whatnot. And I would work around it a little bit with some students. 

But there was really what an organization, the Ramblin' Rec Club, did, but it was really a competition to be who would be the driver. 

And the driver, almost paying worse than death, was charged with, don't let anything happen to it and keep it running and keep it secure and keep it working and it does and it did it seems to pretty much do that that it it there were attempts at stealing it on occasion not to steal it steal it but the georgia people especially you know they oh oh yeah they always wanted to get it and do it do just a a lacquer finish red and black paint job on it they always thought that would just be the most beautiful thing could you imagine what a disaster that would be it never happened though no they never never got it they came close because sometimes the way they'd transport it to games you just could never let it out of sight i mean someone had to be in it sitting in it vigilance was the word huh constant vigilance um the rec parades themselves were great traditions oh yeah that's been going on since the teens or before when one Now, you had a role to play in that eventually, what Dean Doe gave you the assignment to make them a bit safer? 

Well, in the late, Dean Doe I think came in 57, right around 58, 59, somewhere in there. 

They evolved the wrecked things themselves from say wheeled vehicles that had at some point been an automobile, or something like an automobile, and they'd just go at them and make them into all kinds of Rube Goldberg contraptions. 

Well, then they started getting into an event which the students called floats, which were some kind of a mechanized thing that they'd build a body on it that did something or was for something. As I said, I was kind of getting away from the tradition, but it went through its little cycle. 

One of the things they used to do, they'd get a dumpster dumpster and motorize it and and and that's the time I put it in the parade yeah and the parade route was up around the parking lot in the back of the library which is a very steep hill I mean it still it still is like that same same place but then they'd come around the street and up around the back there well they'd get up every now and they'd get away a lot of people would be down at the bottom of the hill the one time when these Dempster and Opster things just got away and it didn't really hurt somebody bad. 

I think there was a cheerleader or somebody down there, you know, jumping out of the way or broke her arm or something like that. 

So they decided, hey, you know, this is getting kind of dangerous. 

So we're going to have to, well, one of the things that they say, okay, when you, we're going to have to do these, have to make some, some genuine, some, well, not not genuine but some baseline safety rules the the vehicles have to run they can't have gyrating parts that really that really spec could fly off and fly into the crowd I mean they can have things that turn but not not that that fly away and they had to have something that would make them stop and up to then nobody had ever made that a rule well they might have had they might have had stuff on it that they didn't take off necessarily but being able to stop or hold it sitting was something that they had to do and the other thing is have a fire extinguisher with you because they're running they're running raw gas they'd be right they'd be running gas out of a bathtub or out of a just a bucket you know pouring it so it could be very dangerous oh yeah so wonder I wasn't yeah more so so we even though that looked so rudimentarily unsafe you know if you're standing there with a fire extinguisher and you got some stuff going you know they well I guess we're very fortunate as much as anything hearing you tell this story I think we're very fortunate and then a little then because of the thing they were trying to get out of say it's supposed to be a wreck you know that's whatever that tradition is and they had of course a lot of pictures and stuff from let's say the 20s and teens and this kind of thing but if it if it isn't a wreck say if you're just building a float that's like a floating beach you know scene or something that's that's it's kind of neat but it's out of the tradition yeah it's supposed to be so then they started yeah then they started category say okay then we'll have category categories because there were some other things like saying nice old cars like that they have some in which is it's not inappropriate to be in a thing like that says it okay well I have categories you can be in the in the old car division class the classics right You can be in the float division, or you can be in the rattle trap contraption, wreck-wreck-wreck tradition. And then they'd have winners of each or something that you could... 

So it got itself organized that way. It got itself organized. And it pretty much has. 

But the groups that had those vehicles there were times, well now there's fewer and fewer places to store stuff. 

So the old back fences and some of those fields, they could pull stuff in and let them sit for a year and then drag them out the next fall and... 

So now it's more starting from scratch every time. 

Well, they go to the junkyard and get a couple of things. 

Well, there's some, or they find places off campus where they can kind of keep the rudiments of the vehicle and drag it out. It's a fun tradition, though. Oh, yes. 

I think it's one people like to talk about more than they like to come to, though, because the crowds are not as big as they used to be. They have them at an odd time, very early in the morning. 

Well, the other thing is, the thing that's made so much difference is people can't plan anymore to come to a football game and know when it is. Yeah. Because with TV and all these other things, they change the hours and everything. Sometimes you don't know until a few days before. 

So you never know. 

So people can't plan. That's why they have to make the parades at 9 o'clock or 8 o 'clock in the morning. They can't say, okay, we'll have brunch at 10 and then the parades at 11 to 1 and games at 2. you that that doesn't work still at all it's a pretty popular that's right no it is it is and it's you know all when we're talking about steel the word stealing came up I remembered the story about the tea with you mm-hmm tell us about that well well I I guess both Jim and I were kind of fearful one is you did it occurred every year or so that get one for something either give to somebody or to do something with, and even though you, well, all of us that had some responsibility were just scared of not, yeah, it was liability, but really just someone really getting hurt. 

Again, a miracle that it never, that it did, and because they, and when we were both retiring, we, you know, I think we mentioned it, I said, geez, you know, you just didn't want to talk about it. You were afraid. I figured they would for Jim. We both retired left at the same time. 

I figured they would for Jim, but I thought that whoever was going to be behind it, they'd go and really work something out with the campus police and somehow. 

They didn't do that, did they? 

Well, I remember walking out one morning to get my paper, and here's this thing, you know. Tell me what this thing was. 

Well, it was a T. It was a big white T. 

Yeah, and it was the one that when you come down from, driving down, what is it, first drive from the student center, going toward the administration building, it was the one up there on the left. 

And so they actually stole it, brought it, and put it on your front yard? 

Yeah, and it was, yeah, the publications people that had done this. And they had reconnoitered and worked at it and gotten tools and this kind of thing. 

Of course, some of them were better riders than they were electricians and plumbers and tool workers, but they managed to get up there and get it off without falling down or hurting themselves. 

So scary, isn't it, that they would even undertake that. And now, of course, you get expelled if you take a T now. 

Well, I guess I'm figuring that it became more to see if you could get away with it than to do it for some reason. And it was a thing of honor. I remember the critical plant guy, I said, yeah, I'll make sure you get it back. I said, we're having a big event in about three or four days, you know, and we want to use it. 

So the tea came to your retirement party? 

No, no, it was there. It was here. We had a big thing here, and we decorated it with Christmas lights and whatnot. 

But you gave it back. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. 

Well, the thing is, I remember when they stole one for, I guess, Ed Harrison. 

And they mounted it on a, it wasn't mahogany, but it was a real nice wood finished block on wheels, and it lit up. 

But what do you do with it? 

Yeah, what do you do with it? 

What do you do with it? 

It takes up quite a lot of space. 

Yeah, and then once the novelty is off a little bit, there's not that many people understand, or the tradition are all about it. 

So, and then they wanted to get them, they had a couple of them that they'd have to keep refurbishing because they're, the way they were lit, the neon inside them was just not the easiest thing to duplicate. eventually they booby -trapped them so that the alarms got somebody once in a while somebody still gets one yeah but in this age of happy litigation oh yeah no and it probably I guess some other way of recognition needs to be the tradition needs to be retired and every time we think it has yeah another one bites the dust as they say but how fortunate that no one has been killed. It is. 

When we talk about your life, we forgot to mention, or we haven't brought up yet, the fact that you were a student yourself. As you were at Tech, you were going to Georgia State. 

Well, after I came back from the student center, I'd assumed at some point I needed to or ought to go to grad school, and I really really should have before I took that associate dean's position or I should have had one to be that. That was the feeling you had. That was the feeling I had and it was kind of in the job description and so forth. 

And I had made an application and talked about it and it's one of those things of course when you're there and I was and had a family we were in between in PTA and Indian guides and church stuff and just doing what people do well of course Georgia State is I mean part of its mission is to be available for classes whenever someone has to take them so I did I started down there at night and you know taking a course or two every now and then but as as many things happen and come up it took me about well almost five years to do half of it and then of course you know if you don't finish it in a certain amount of time you start losing I wasn't going to do that front end stuff I just was not going to do that so essentially I did half of it in five years and another half of it in another half a year or whatever whatever that was and that was I just I just cussed it out and you know I and you got your master's in education right in 1979 yeah at last at last at last yeah and the kids were there and you know my mother-in-law and we did that and it was fun I used to do that and i did it now say what it did for me it probably very limited but it gave you a great deal of satisfaction right it was necessary and it was done that's important um you've had a pretty fortunate life have you not very much so very much so would you have changed anything if you could no i i not really uh i mean there was some momentary lapses and things that everybody Everybody has, but I've... Still glad you took the job. Still glad I took the job. That was good. And that smooth talker Jim... That's right. 

Well, yeah. He didn't necessarily ****** me into it, but it... No, it was something I wanted to do. He convinced me that, hey, look, you need to do this now. Now. 

I said, look, you know, yeah, it's nice that you obligated yourself to do something you're going to commit, you know, you were going to live up to your... That's nice, and that's good to know. 

But this is your time. 

But talking... This is your time. and that probably bothered me more than doing it but but again it didn't leave somebody in the lurch it was just walking out on them it worked out yeah tell me about your boys now what's Philip doing well two they were born in 67 and 69 Philip he went through here graduated from North Fulton High School and went to Georgia Southern in the business and ended up getting a degree there had a good college experience and he's married to he's married to Lois Lois Forge who's a girl from a dairy farm in Decorah Iowa who who had interesting she came you know the the paper institute moved from was it law was Appleton Wisconsin down here well she she had finished high school and applied to college she had an uncle who had been to paper Institute and she thought well this is handy it's not that far from home it's in eastern Iowa where she lives and she wanted to get into the paper business and chemistry business which that that's what it was and her uncle kind of steered her into that that's something she should do well between the time she applied and was accepted and started the place just moved moved down here so that changed her life she came and in fact I kind of remember her because we our office we did little things for those students there's only about 90 students in that school most of all PhD or masters and PhD students and we'd do things like ID cards and some services and I remember she came through we talked one time I said oh yeah this is before she she met my son and they met at church both of them she just came to our church this big Lutheran country up there where she came from and she came she came to church and my son was starting a young adult group or trying to start one and she just fit into that and they just met there good thing that paper institute that paper institute or you wouldn't have your That's right. She's a very, very bright, very lovely young woman. And has her Ph. D. And has a Ph. D. and is a chemical engineer and has been working for Procter & Gamble since 96. Do they live in this area? 

No, they moved to Cincinnati. She worked here a couple of years and finished some work she was doing. And now they live in Cincinnati. And they moved to Cincinnati. 

In the paper business, if you're going to get anywhere in the big paper people places, you have to build a paper machine and make paper. That's like a check-off. PHD is a check-off. Make paper. And they don't, I mean the paper machine is about as big as three or four football fields. It's not a little thing. Usually they're in river towns, they build them in Sweden and bring them up in barges. 

Well they were building one in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. And she got in on the team to put this machine together, build it and make paper. 

Okay, so she's getting that check mark. 

So she did that, she did that, 18 months. 

And then she did that, made paper and then she was looking around for the next thing and it's gone back now to Cincinnati again where she's some in R&D. Tell us about Eric. 

Well, Eric, he went to Auburn. He's kind of the RT person in industrial design. Both of them, they didn't want to go with me. They grew up around Tech. They knew everybody. They said, that's too close. And I agreed with them. That really was too close, especially. 

And they said, well, he wanted to go no more than a state away at a place that people heard about, and that was a good choice. And they had a good program there in industrial design. 

And he went, it's a five year program, and he finished it in just about then, except for his mono, his senior mono doing his design project phase, which it gave him a little longer while he recuperated a little bit and then he did that and he he he wanted to work in he wanted to do like computer enhanced work and here now it isn't that long ago it's been in the last 10 years but of course that that technology has grown so much that it he didn't have a chance to do much in learning at Auburn of that and then the the jobs were hard to come by so one of his roommates and his buddies from there, they were just doing stuff. He was, you know, working here and there and whatever. 

And then his buddy from Tampa called him one day and said, hey Eric, this company down here that makes sports t-shirt equipment, designs things for like race car drivers and that kind of thing. They're hiring people to do design and he was designing T-shirts or make things like that. And I said, Eric, I'll rent you a car. You go down there and find out if this is a job, you get it. 

So he went down, and they did. They hired him pretty much on the spot. And he and this guy, they lived in his mother's house and set up shop. 

Well, then he invested in, well, it was about a $7,000 PC so that they could do some of the stuff he wanted to do and he could learn to do himself along with just having a job well then he he fell into a thing where this entertainment artist the one that does video games they do John Madden football and he someone knew somebody who knew somebody and he went over to Orlando where this guy was setting up shop and Eric was about the and this other guy were the fifth or sixth people in that organization and that John Madden football was their big deal I mean they physically do it they make the characters draw the thing he's got a fun job then well he did that he did that about four or five years and then they said well they're gonna be making Madden football when you're 50 years old so there were four people and by that time there's about 90 people in that company and he said well you're not going to be doing that forever so about four or five of them decided they're going to start their own business and they're going to do essentially computer enhancement post -production like they do ads websites enhancement animations this is to live down in Florida right so they started this thing these four guys have been on the two back bedrooms and a guy I had just bought a house when I was just married and they didn't use those two rooms and they did that until the neighbors, you know, thought this was rather unusual. And anyway, they bought space in there with those four or five people in their own company. 

Well, that's wonderful. And they're doing all right. It's like any new company. Hey, it's slow going and a little questionable, but hey, you know. He's doing great. They're doing. And he recently made it. 

And he married, he met a girl down there, met in a church parking lot, he was a sister of one of his buddies there. And her name is? 

Her name is Shannon. And she's from West Palm, or she grew up in West Palm, and lived there. They were married in April of 2000. well he brought her up here to visit a time or two and and Thanksgiving when he said well he came he was home with her and my brother he had announced well he says I need to tell you something is it was his well I I asked the other day I asked Shannon to marry me and she said yes I don't know what do I do now that's right so step at a time that's right well you you have two beautiful daughters as you put it to me which I thought you said my girls my girls very nice yeah oh they're just they're very I mean they're very nice bright articulate people and they tolerate me that's right it and and now you're retired but you said your name between your neighbors and well I did my fun job after I left Tech. Tell us about that. 

Well I again I just fell into something one of the person I had worked with before called me up when he said what are you doing? 

I thought what do you mean like this afternoon? 

I said no like day to day. 

I said there's stuff you know I had a lot of home stuff I was doing and some yard stuff and I'm sorting boxes of papers that I had just accumulated and some things I was giving to archives and sorting myself and he says well now there's a guy you ought to meet he said this guy has a shop and he said he he's worked at this stuff for a long time but he opened his own shop and he said he can't afford like the big time mechanics you know to work in this but he needs he needs some help you know just what kind of a shop was it well he said it's a Mercedes repair this person has worked in for the big Mercedes shops gone to all their schools so these are dream cars that's right and he says he he just needs service help someone that'll show up for work and do the things that need to be done and he says you know how to do this stuff and i said well i said i've never opened the hood of a mercedes except to look at it never fix it or work on it he says he knows what to do you know you just so i thought well I'll talk to anybody I'll visit so I went in and and I didn't and you tell you what you want he says I just need he said if you've serviced and worked on cars all your life that's what these are he said if there's if there's something you don't know where is or what we know that we have the manuals and the books on how to do things I just need help that that isn't you know big time that isn't the only thing because he was just just getting so you donned your overalls and you started yeah he put it yeah he put a uniform and had my shirt with that on it yeah auto bends and and you had a good time I had a wonderful time for six years I did that and then I had a well I had I needed I had a little problem with my eyes I had some cataract things and any and I mean that's that's very routine type surgery but the thing when you're doing something like working in that garage you can't be in the dirt when you're here and you know things out and I just you know and I was had some other things I wanted to do so I tried to retire yeah I retired but you keep your hand on the mechanics by fixing oh yeah well I've done that I've fooled around with that stuff all my life I mean literally all my life so and you still have your dad's car Yeah, it's my first car. And that's a 19? 21 Model T. It's a, I guess the official word for that, it was a depot hack. 

But Ford didn't make them. It was an aftermarket thing. It was like the JC Whitney companies of the world. 

There was a, because Model Ts were made so long, there were all kinds of aftermarket companies just making bodies and things. and special stuff, but this was a little sort of like the forerunner of a station wagon. 

But my dad had a truck farm, I mean, besides farming and stuff, he raised vegetables and strawberries and asparagus, and he got that to take the stuff to market. And you still have it, it's still in reading order. 

Yeah, it was just stuck back in the garage in the Depression, and they couldn't keep it going, but instead of throwing it away, he just stuck it back in the corner of the shed. Yay! Good thing he didn't throw it away. And it's a little adventure for you just to take it out once in a while and keep it going. 

Well, you have had a pretty charmed life, I think. I have. I've been most fortunate. It seems so. And Tech was most fortunate having you come there. 

Well, I did. You left a good impression on a lot of students over those almost 30 years. 

Well, we had an enjoyable time. 

It was, you know, the students came, they went, some changed, some were good or better than others, but it, hey. Overall, it was a thumbs up. Good place, good people. That's right, that's right. 

Well, we're glad that you came. We're glad that you let us come talk to you about all this today.