Search results
(1 - 17 of 17)
- Title
- Oral History Interview with Diane Pike, 2015
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Title
- Transcript of Oral History Interview with Reverend Dave Wold, 2015
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Search Result
-
Interview with Dave Wold
Interviewed on March 7, 2015
Augsburg College Oral History Project
Interviewed by Janet Meyer
Dave Wold- DW
Janet Meyer JM
Time Log
00.01 JM: This is Janet Meyer of the Augsburg College Oral History Project. I'm here to
interview Dave Wold about his experiences as ...
Show more Interview with Dave Wold Interviewed on March 7, 2015 Augsburg College Oral History Project Interviewed by Janet Meyer Dave Wold- DW Janet Meyer JM Time Log 00.01 JM: This is Janet Meyer of the Augsburg College Oral History Project. I'm here to interview Dave Wold about his experiences as Campus Pastor at Augsburg College. We're at Pastor Dave's home in Arden hills, MN. Today is March 7, 2015. Thank you for participating in this. Would you please start by giving us information about your background and education? 00.35 DW: I was a preacher's kid so I lived in five different towns growing up. Born in Wadena, MN. Lived there just briefly because my dad had just taken a call and moved to Stephen's Point, WI. Had my pre-school years there and then to Red Wing MN where I did elementary school and then Fort Worth, TX where I did junior high and part of high school and then finished high school in St. PauL Went on to St. Olaf College and from there to Luther Seminary. I served with my father for a few years. We said it was the father and son looking for the Holy Ghost! And that was a wonderful experience and then to a very large church in Golden Valley. I was actually always thinking I might go to medical school so I was actually filling out what I needed in terms of medical courses or pre-med courses at the U but then this opportunity came up. A rare opportunity as they said to head the largest Lutheran youth program in the country and that was at a church in Golden Valley. And then I was thinking again about maybe medical school or graduate school and then another rare opportunity came up and that was to head our denomination's youth program, and I did that for a few years but I was traveling 200 days a year at least, and rd sometimes be well, at least in the summer 7, 8 or 9 weeks in East Germany, wasn't even able to communicate with my family. One night one of my daughters who was about 2 at the time, said to my wife "Is Daddy coming over tonight?" and I knew, wow, that's kind of a wake-up call. And just about that time our denomination which was the American Lutheran Church had voted to merge with another denomination that's called Lutheran Church of America as well as the smaller group, Association of Evangelical Lutheran Churches (AELC) I think that was the name, which was a break off from the Missouri Synod, and they were going to form the larger church which is now ELCA so I knew this a time maybe to look at something else and somebody just at that time said "I noticed there was an opening at Augsburg College for a college pastor. Can I nominate you?" and I said "yes, you can nominate me." So I was nominated and as happens with more positions at a college you have hundreds of people apply and so I didn't take it as seriously as I maybe could have at the time but I went through the interviews. It was extensive interviews, maybe half dozen committees I think 1 for a couple, three days and one thing led to the next and pretty soon I was called to be college pastor at Augsburg. 04.02 JM: Great. 04.03 DW: And that was wonderful because I was able to be with my family every night at least, even though the hours were long and there was always work to be done but I was in town and that was a real blessing. So that's kind of my vocational journey, and then I ended up being there 30 years. 04.36 JM: Great. So what attracted you to the position? 04.40 DW: Well, I had ... I was thinking that I was going to go on to medical school or some form of graduate school but I think probably because of the change in what was going on with the denomination, the merger that was sort of what you call a kairos time to think about something else because I knew I liked the Twin Cities, and the office was going to be in Chicago and so I would have probably had to move if I would have continued in that position, but also just because it's an educational institution it was, you know, very exciting to think about being in a setting like that. I think most people have thought of their college years as some of the best years of their life. Why not work in a college if your best years are college years, why not make that a vocation? Plus the fact that it was started for very a particular specific reason by Norwegian Lutherans. 06.03 JM: The college? 06.04 DW: The college. To educate holistically, to have the intellectual, the physical and the spiritual all in balance, and that's the genius of a Christian liberal arts college I think. I went to one of them, St. Olaf, and my wife went to Concordia. We've had a lot of family members, pretty much every family member has gone to one of those kind of schools, so it's been part of our DNA I guess. In fact my great, great grandfather was one of the founders of St. Olaf college so it's really part of our DNA. And a lot of family members that have taught or worked at different Lutheran colleges. 07.00 JM: Okay. So let's talk a little about the changes that you saw occur to Augsburg over the 30 years from 1983 to 2013 07 .10 DW: I should just double check. Do you think it's loud enough? Do you need to check? JM: 07.19 DW: It looks fine. Thank you. I'll move a little closer just in case. 07 .25 JM: It looks fine. So what was Augsburg like in 1983 versus now? Any systemic changes, cultural changes ... 2 7 .36 DW: Yeah, I could even back up even further because when I was in high school, Augsburg was pretty basic. In fact one of the famous stories was of Bernhard Christensen. That he, as you know, is legendary in terms of his spirituality but also his commitment to a city, so Augsburg has always had a commitment to the city. Except maybe the first years when they came, and they were considered farm land because the center of the city was really at St. Anthony Falls and this was on the outskirts of town when you didn't have to make a commitment to a city. Bernhard Christensen was dating his wife, I don't know the exact details but maybe she was being brought in for an interview or, She used to tell the story. Anyway they went on a ride. She wanted to see Augsburg College and it was a long, long ride, and she said, "Well, are we ever going to get to Augsburg?" and he said, "Oh, well we went by it half an hour ago but I didn't really want to point it out because it's such a humble place." [Dave laughs] Augsburg has never pretended to blow people away with its facilities. It has adequate facilities but in a small campus like that you can't show yourself off much. So in high school they had just a tremendous basketball team and in those days the Minneapolis Lakers had already moved to Los Angeles. There was no professional hockey, so it was the front page of every sports section because of the tremendous basketball team and you'd have to get to the gym a couple hours early sometimes just to get a seat. and we would come as a team as many basketball players would do, and in those days basketball was kind of king. and it was just the rocking place. They had a big master plan down in the basement of Melby Hall. Melby Hall had just been built and it was exciting to see the student center, now Christensen Center, the two tower dorms were going to be built and all those things. Because at that time it was only Old Main, the science hall which still is the science hall, the library just is around that other 'L' part and then the Memorial Hall which was a dormitory at that time. Then I think across the street actually from the gym, Melby Hall, was another dormitory. It also might have been used by some of the nursing students that were from St. Olaf that got part of their training at Fairview. But in between were just a lot of houses and of course Murphy Square which is still there. So it was not a real impressive place. When I came in '83 of course Christensen Center existed, the tower dorms existed. The music hall had just been built. In fact our denomination had some fingers in part of the building there. I don't know exactly what the arrangement was but that they would use the Sateren auditorium for some things so we came over and used that for showing of films and things like that. And then the old building, which is now tom down, was supposed to be very temporary. It was just a cinder block building which was first a student center then became the art building and then it was a bunch of offices. Very energy inefficient they discovered, so they tore it down. Now it's just a parking lot right next to the music building, between the music building and Melby Hall. So there were not all that many buildings. Charles Anderson was president at that time, but in 1983 it was pretty lean, a pretty lean time for Augsburg. The numbers, the admission numbers were down significantly in '82 and '83 and they had to look for alternative ways to raise revenue. Because you know Augsburg has never had a large endowment, you're "tuition driven" so the idea of weekend college came up and that's when they started weekend college with a guy named Rick Thoni who is what I call Augsburg's magician. He was able to create a very large number of attending weekend college. I think at one time it was 1,500 maybe. 3 13 :30 JM: That's a lot. 13 .34 DW: Yeah. Then when he became vice-president of enrollment management he developed some other programs, scholarship programs especially brought in some, a wonderful new batch of students and then when he went to Rochester to start the Rochester program again he created magic so at least three times in Augsburg's career, Rick Thoni has kind of been the savior of Augsburg college, and I just have the most admiration of him of all people. He's just a wonderful hard working guy. So weekend college was cranking up, the numbers were starting to come back again. Right at that time, just about the time I started, just a little bit before, a fellow by the name of Julian Foss, who had gone to Augsburg Academy, not Augsburg College but Augsburg Academy which was a high school, came on campus along with Sig Hjelmeland in the Development Office and he said where's the chapel? And they said we really don't have a chapel. There had been a chapel space which is now the art studio in Old Main. That was the chapel for the old Augsburg College and Augsburg Academy probably. Julian Foss had been successful in investing in particularly in Nike shoes. He said, "Well I'm willing to give quite a significant amount of money to have you build a center which would be a worship center, a theater as a part of it and a communication center as part of it." He wanted all three in one and that was the beginning of the thinking of what's now Foss Center and so right after I started, we formed a committee and they asked if I would be on it. Of course I would as chaplain. The chair of the committee was the dean at the time, Richard Green. Richard Green took another position almost immediately so that meant the president came to me and asked if I would chair the committee. It was a great honor but also a little bit sensitive because I was representing one of the three interests that were going into the building. But it was something I did accept, and we had a hard working committee for five years to put that building together. We would have very early meetings. I think sometimes as early at 6:30 but often at 7:00 every Tuesday. The first part was just developing a charter so that it would talk about the usage of the building and primary to that, so we had representatives from the faculty out of different departments, representing theater, communications, religion and then other disciplines as well. And the charter essentially ended up saying that this building is primarily for Augsburg students. That is a wonderful statement and a commitment to who we're about and we made some strong statements about our Christian liberal arts heritage and continuation of that. I think over the years that's kind of been lost because anytime that you can see this as an opportunity to raise revenue, rent the space and things, you can kind of forget about those things. The biggest problem became putting the three spaces together because for worship purposes you want spaciousness and light, for theater purposes you want smallness, intimacy and darkness. So for a couple of years really we were trying to do things together. Well I should even back up. I thought a model of this would be at two places because as all of the architects made their proposals as to who we should select, I studied carefully the buildings that each had done. I liked a couple of spaces that Sovik, Mathre, Sathrum, Quanbeck and Schlink from Northfield had done on 2 sister college campuses, one St. Olaf and one Concordia. Concordia had the Centrum, a gathering place. The chapel was primary to it but they had other things there, banquets, etc. It was a part of the college center there. I think dances and other things like that. They had a nice balcony wrap-around there. And at St. Olaf they had a 4 similar space called the Urness Recital Hall and that was a part of the music building where recitals were held as well as small concerts. We would visit different sites that the architects were proud of. We were invited down to St. Olaf and we had lunch there and then in the afternoon had our meetings in that Urness Recital Hall and after the afternoon meeting we said this is what will work for us. So we chose Sovik, Mathre, Sathrum, Quanbeck and Schlink, and Terry Schlink became our architect and he was an Augsburg grad. 19.43 JM: Oh, that's good. 19.47 DW: Actually the Quanbeck in that firm was also an Augsburg grad, Robert Quanbeck. He was the brother of Phil Quanbeck, Sr. who was a very Augsburg distinguished Augsburg faculty member. Now his son, Phil Quanbeck II is on the faculty in religion. So there's a strong Augsburg connection to that firm, and it was really fun working with them. But I think it was two years into the planning when we said, you know it's just not going to work to combine these because worship needs more space and more light; theater needs more intimacy; and communication changes by the day so this was going to be hard to have a communications center there. So we separated the spaces by expanding the practice theater and making it a big black box. We figured if you needed proscenium ... we had all kinds of reasons for that because we would have had a hydraulic stage what would go up for thrust stage and do down for orchestra pit and proscenium. We had all kinds of things that would have worked but then we talked to ... like people from Luther who said well we have a hydraulic stage like that too but whenever the air conditioning is on it doesn't work--it freezes. So there are reasons why we were a little hesitant in going that route. It would have been a beautiful concept, but then how were our theater students going to get the experience on a proscenium stage? Well there were 7 theaters within walking distance of Augsburg College. They could choose any one of them for those types of theater experiences and that's once again the advantage of being in the Twin Cities. And of course Minneapolis is second only to, or the Twin Cities, is second only to New York for theater seats. There were lots of opportunities, and then Communications has their own wing, the TV studio and things like that so that. And the big question was, would the donor go for that? and that was the job of Charles Anderson and he handled it beautifully. And when the day of the dedication came Julian Foss could not have been more pleased with what turned out so I think it was a beautiful building. There were lots of bridges to cross like would we put a basement in or would it just be ground floor like the music building. Would be go tile? or put carpet in? Well, we spend a dollar and a dollar, because we knew that a college building gets a lot of use, and it might have to last a couple hundred years. And it's proven to be a very, very welcoming building and worked really nicely and people love it. Hillary Clinton has been there twice for various reasons in that space. She really loves that space. She has used that for a hearing once when her husband was elected president and she was in charge of looking at changes to the medical plans. 23 .25 JM: The health care? 5 23 .26 DW: Yeah, the health care and so she used Augsburg as a Twin Cities spot for that. We've had senate debates and governor debates. Lots of nice opportunities, great concerts, of course Chapel every day. That might be a good segue. Let's talk about campus ministries and chapel. 23.42 JM: However you'd like to describe ... what's the role of campus ministries? 24.00 DW: Yeah well it is a good segue because there was no chapel building so chapel met three days a week and it was in the gymnasium, Melby Hall. One third of that could be sectioned off, you could pull a curtain, pull an altar out and they could pull out the bleaches, or it could be at Sateren auditorium, or the cafeteria. We used the cafeteria eventually most of the time because it was right in the center of campus, and that was all before we moved into the new building. But we were only meeting 3 days a week. I think Augsburg College is probably the only college in the country that actually added chapels, chapel services. So we went to 5 days a week and that was by unanimous vote of the faculty back in 1988. Probably 1987, a year before we moved in '88. and that's sort of unheard of because even some of our sisters colleges, Lutheran colleges even took like a day away so they might have 4 day chapel or 3 day chapel, but we went from 3 to 5 which I think is quite remarkable. Obviously Augsburg, given it's profile, it's demographics, there's a lot of commuters so a lot of people just kind of come in and go out according to their class because they also have jobs to go to so it's not a residential community as such. We could back up again and say since '83 they've built a number of new residence halls so you have Anderson Hall, you have what's now Luther Hall, they used to call it new hall. They should have said instead of N-E-W, they should have used G-N-U then they could have celebrated some of the animals that run around Africa. (Laughs) and then of course over at Oren Gateway there's residential space. So that was in an effort, again kind of a Rick Thoni idea to bring more students to create a campus community. But one ofmy thoughts was okay, if we're not going have a community every day at 10:20, or 11 :20 on Tues and Thurs in those days, we need to create communities elsewhere so I, we, put a lot of effort into our presence in other places. I would like to, I tried to eat at the cafeteria almost every day, and I got to know people that way and hear their needs and become a part of various communities that way. We got invited to a lot of communities. But particularly in the athletic community we became important. One of the big changes -- there was no football field, no athletic field when I came but again Jeroy Carlson and some of his friends (Jeroy is who we call Mr. Augsburg) and he was once I think in charge of alumni then he became a fundraiser and he's the guy that raised most of the money for a lot of the projects there like the Lindell Library, the athletic field and things like that. They figured that they could by tearing a couple of houses down and refiguring a couple of things, they could get an athletic field and they did. So they were playing their football games, and I think maybe soccer too, at Parade Stadium downtown. so we suddenly had a football field and they needed an announcer so they asked if I'd be the announcer so I was and I still am actually the announcer for football, basketball and wrestling. And I would meet with the team before the home games and we'd have a devotional time and that goes on to this day with a guy named Mike Magson who now is part time at Augsburg as the chaplain to athletes and also is working as a strength coach and he's a pastor across the freeway now at Bethany 6 Lutheran Church. So we had many opportunities to meet with the athletic teams on their turf. A lot of them came to chapel on the days of their games or the day before their games too, so there's a real symbiotic relationship with athletics and that was again in the concept of--okay, if not everybody has the opportunity to come to chapel every day, we can create chapels for them around the campus. So that is a long way of saying how Augsburg is probably unique in their campus ministry than a lot of other colleges. 29.43 JM: Okay, that's a great point. 29.50 DW: I sometimes judge things by how many references I'm asked to write per year and how many weddings I'm asked to do, and you know I could easily do 400 to 500 references a year for students that were going on to graduate school or summer jobs and things like that and weddings -- you know one time I just counted how many I could have done in one summer and I think it was 4 7 or 48 in just one summer and so you know it was as a result of entry into the worlds of students that might not automatically wind their way over to the chapel. 30.38 JM: So you took chapel to them. 30.40 DW: Basically, yeah, I kind of ... food truck, chapel truck. [Dave smiles] 30.49 JM: One more question before we leave the ministry topic. How does a Lutheran college find ways to be inclusive of all religious beliefs? 31.03 DW: Yeah well I think there's different slants to Lutheranism and especially as you look at the different countries that have been representing Lutheranism. You know you look at Northern Europe in particular -- I'll try to not draw this out, because I could talk about this for hours because a lot of Lutherans have not been very receptive to everybody. Because in Norway there's so many valleys, some people have gotten so used to living in their own valley and using their own dialect and things like that, that they didn't see any need to be inclusive, but Lutheran theology really is based on grace and openness and acceptance. God's unearned love and favor is the definition of grace. I think I look at Luther's explanation to the third article which is the explanation to the third part of the creed which is about the Holy Spirit and it goes like this: "I believe I cannot by my own understanding or effort believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to him but the Holy Spirit calls me through the gospel, enlightens me with gifts, sanctifies and keeps me in true faith. In the same way he calls, gathers, enlightens and sanctifies the whole Christian church on earth and keeps it united with Jesus Christ in the one true faith." and then it goes on a little bit more. But basically I think the way we as Lutherans operate is we say we cannot coerce people through formulas, religious formulas or whatever but if we allow people to have the gospel in their hands, the gospel calls us, so called through the gospel. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was one of the more amazing Lutherans of course he was killed standing up to Hitler --- martyred and he chose to go back to, you know the whole story, to Germany after having kind of a nice position in New York. In his Letters and Papers from Prison there's a point towards the end that said maybe 7 sometimes I tried to push the gospel on people or to coerce people but the gospel can stand on it's own and I think that's the approach that Lutherans, okay we can be very open, we respect people where they stand, but we also allow because of being a confessional church, we gather around the confessions, things we agree on and that things we don't agree on you know the gospel can inform us all. We're all in a kind growth pattern in our faith so I think Augsburg has been by and large been pretty good at being accepting and non-judgmental of the way you do your religion, your faith, your spirituality. I don't know if that answered the question. 34.42 JM: I think it did. What, if any, influence does the location of Augsburg in the CedarRiverside neighborhood impact what you just said about the mix of cultures or ethnicities? 35.04 DW: Yeah, being a kid that went to a inner city high school in St. Paul, I guess I've thought of Augsburg as being a part of an even broader community and certainly the Cedar-Riverside communities are important but you look at the Philips. We built a home in the Philips with Habitat for Humanity one year in conjunction with some agencies and churches there and that's a very large native American community. I've heard probably the largest collection of Native Americans in even the Midwest even more so than some reservations. But then you go to St. Paul and you have the Hmong population, which is second largest only to California; the Liberians, largest population or concentration in the country, so the profile of the Twin Cities since 1983 has changed from I think less than 5% of the population, I think significantly less than 5%, to I think I heard the other day to 17 or 18% maybe even 19% of the population. That has been primarily of course in the Twin Cities. So yes Cedar-Riverside is one part of it but it goes far beyond that. And the students have done remarkable things with finding their ways into the various communities with Cedar-Riverside being primary, with Seward also. We used to have something called Ministries on the Mississippi and it was the churches of CedarRiverside, Seward and over on the university campus. So we would have University of Minnesota Campus Ministries, Lutheran Campus Ministries, the Lutheran chaplains from University hospitals, University Church of Hope, Grace Church on the university campus, we had Bethany, we had Augsburg and we had Trinity that worships at Augsburg and a couple other entities also so that brought 3 basic communities together. We did some projects and things like that together for quite a few years. 37.58 JM: What kinds of projects? 37.59 DW: It was probably more things about ... well we did Lenten worships, you know the worshipping type things together, but we did kind of social things, trips down the river and things like that, kind of celebrating the river. I think maybe there were some Habitat things going on. Some youth, you know combined youth activities and it's been a while since. 38.45 JM: That's okay. 8 38:47 DW: Addressing some young adult issues as young adults would come to the Twin Cities. We had a young adult transition center. I actually created that where we had a couple, three houses on our campus and young adults who would come to the Twin Cities could live there for a short period of time as they were being transitioned in the Cities, and then we would once a week have activities for them at night. One of the unique things about Augsburg is that we are flexible to try so many things. And sometimes things work and sometimes things don't. There were environmental things along the river there. Lots of different . . . some food programs. I remember Thanksgiving dinners for the community. That was at Bethany. Between housing and food and environmental things, there were lots of things going on. 40.11 JM: So the young adult transition center ... they were not students? 40.16 DW: No, not students. 40.18 JM: They were just neighborhood .. . 40.20 DW: Yeah, people coming in from ... Winner, SD would have a chance to have a place to live for two or three months. 40.30 JM: Until they got their feet on the ground. That's very nice. So you were involved in the Urban Basketball. Would that fit in with what you were describing? 40.46 DW: Yeah that would be another thing. 40.52 JM: It was a tournament? Do you want to describe it? 40.54 DW: We started ... one of the things I did, I gathered youth professionals, I called them professionals because they could be pastors or youth directors, once a month for what we called the youth ministry round table. And that was right away when I started. There's also a guy named Jim Grubs who had a youth background. He was with Young Life organization and I had been more focused on the churches. So we brought in people that might help illumine the people who were in youth ministries in their job. And out of that I saw all of these church gyms. Back in the '80's I counted, of just our denomination, I think there were about ... oh I'd better not even say the number but I think 30 some church gyms and a lot of them were not being used on Sunday afternoons. So we gathered these youth professionals, a lot of them had been a part of our round table, and said let's see what we can do to start a league because so many young people have learned to love basketball. For instance in the particular area where I lived there's a thousand kids playing in the basketball association but by the time we get to high school we only have a handful, so what about all those others that have learned to love basketball? Maybe we could do some things in the church. So that was, you know, we had a thousand kids playing. 9 42.32 JM: That's amazing. 42.35 DW: Sunday afternoons for January and February and then we'd have the big tournament in March at Augsburg. So it was always a big fiesta. It was a great, great, yeah I think it's scaled back a bit now but I think its still going. 42.53 JM: Do you think that increased Augsburg's visibility among those ... ? 42.57 DW: Yeah, it was a great relationship, great thing for the community because they were primarily city churches. There was a nice mix of suburban and city because some of the suburban churches had beautiful gyms. It was a nice mixture. Not without problems. Anytime you're in competition, lots of funny things can happen. 43.19 JM: Like what? 43 .22 DW: Well you know people think that winning is the most important thing. So we had a whole different set of rules. We had equal playing time so everyone had to get equal playing time. We started with devotions, ended with devotions and prayer. We had service projects that were highly emphasized. We tried to build them in to every team concept. But occasionally people took the game a little too seriously, so we kept addressing that, but a lot of ... there's a lot of benefits for the students. You know, we would ... when the tournament went on we would have 100 some Augsburg students running it and a lot of them were involved during the season too as gym managers and coaches and refs and things like that. 44 .21 JM: It sounds like a big deal. 44.23 DW: It was tremendous thing. A lot of those kids came to Augsburg because they were introduced to Augsburg. 44.36 JM: That's what I was thinking. Well good, that sounds like a very good program. So now focusing on you and your career there. What would you describe or could you tell me about some of the challenging times in the 30 years from 1983 to 2013. 44.56 DW: I think the biggest challenge is people that don't totally understand the genius of a Christian liberal arts college and there are people that come in--1 think now they're trying to address it, at least on the faculty side--by having a mission committee. So if a faculty member is interviewing, they also are being interviewed by the mission committee, so they will understand what it means to be a part of Augsburg College knowing it's heritage as a Christian liberal arts school but there are people that come in and they have a whole different model in mind and that would not include the spiritual component. So that manifests itself in different ways and that's another many hour conversation. 46.06 JM: Okay. so that's what the mission committee ... their task? to introduce the new faculty to ... help me understand ... 10 46.15 DW: That's the mission committee and I think it still exists. So if a prospective faculty member is interviewing, they also are being interviewed by the Mission Committee. 46.28 JM: For the spiritual aspect? 46.30 DW: Just to understand not just the spiritual aspect but the whole mission of the college. 46.37 JM: And what is the mission of the college? 46.40 DW: Well the mission would subscribe to the Mission Statement and that has changed over the years. The current Mission Statement I think is different under this administration. Each administration changes that. 46.57 JM: Sure I understand. So that was one of the challenges. Anything else that comes to mind? over 30 years I'm sure there must have been a lot. 47.14 DW: I can say ... I still don't sleep through the night because I was interrupted ... for 30 years I was interrupted pretty much every night and sometimes many times a night. For the crises ... 47.29 JM. Phone calls? 47.30 DW: Phone calls or running to the hospital because of an accident or something like that ... was trying to harm themselves or something like that so it was ... JM: So you had a role of a counselor. 47.46 DW: Um-hmm. Dealing with ... there's a lot of bad stuff that happens on a city college campus or any college campus. lot of things that were ... [phone ringing in background] 48.19 DW: You might want to turn that off. [Pause] 48.29 DW: Sorry about that. 48.30 JM: That's all right. All right and then the rewarding experiences over 30 years. 11 48.37 DW: Well, there were rewarding experiences every day. First of all, it's just a stimulating place to be and you learn something new every day. The people that I met were gifts, so many were gifts. I can't say everyone but ... it was just amazing ... [Dave noted a scene out the window and asked Janet to take a look outside.] It was you know some amazing stories and to see that many were going from point A to point Z. 48.34 JM: The students? 48.36 DW: The students. in terms of intellectual, physical and spiritual development. There's just ... I just heard in the last 24 hours from a couple. One was a person who lived on the streets, now getting a PhD. 50.00 JM: Excellent. 50.02 DW: And had no high school degree. Just kind of amazing stories. Well, Ithink we'll wrap it up here shortly. What do you think ... two more 50.15 JM: questions: how is the perspective of a pastor different (of the students). How is the perspective of the students different than that of the faculty or the administration? 50.33 DW: How is the perspective ... from the pastor's standpoint you mean? 50.39 JM: Yeah. 50.41 DW: Well, I was in a unique position and I think all college pastors and Lutheran college pastors are really in a position of neutrality. You are considered faculty but you're also considered administration. You're kind of, you have a foot in both but you can be a listening ear. You can also at times also be a, take a prophet role if you see that something needs to be challenged or spoken to, some issue, some injustice. Essentially it's a difficult position at times when somebody comes to you with an issue about a faculty member that's ... it's a safe place to come but then it becomes very difficult to know exactly how to resolve everything. There are processes mostly in place but not always. There are people I discovered over the years who just have an axe to grind with religion and they have a found a way to probably direct their hostility towards a chaplain because of that. 52.30 JM: That must be hard. 52.33 DW: It's not been without pain. But it's 97% joy. That's great. And then last question: what would you consider your legacy that 52.46 JM: you left at Augsburg? 52.54 DW: That's a good question. One of the things I learned from my father who learned from his father is that the most important thing a person possesses is their name. And I worked hard at trying to know people's names. When I say worked hard, it wasn't 12 working hard, I basically ... in the early years we had directories and then because of confidentiality issues and things like that, they eliminated that. But there are still ways you can get pictures and know who people are through electronic devices through IT, through programs, athletic programs, etc. So I would pray for students systematically, regularly, every day, every morning, every night. 54.03 JM: Great. 54.13 DW: You can learn people's names that way too [Dave smiles] so you're not only praying for them you're also learning their names. It's hard to be angry with people when you know their name because you know they have a name and they have a mother, and they are a child of God and they're on this earth for a reason and they all have been given gifts and there's just that. You can see potential, you can see the good in every individual because of that. It was fun to watch the potential emerge into full blown action. I guess that would be one of the things. I maybe would say grit. There were easier jobs in the world. I was offered many jobs along the line that would have paid me considerably more but it just seemed like it was a rare opportunity again. Some people call it vocation, some people call it a calling but I think that whole thing has gotten a little bit confusing because they've used it so much. There are rare opportunities that come along and this was a rare opportunity for me and it was one that I really loved. 56.08 JM: Ok, anything you'd like to add about your experience that we haven't discussed. 56.16 DW: Let me look. You know Advent Vespers is kind of an amazing thing. I'd maybe like to tell you a little bit about that. JM: Okay. 56.31 DW: That started in 1980 and I came in 1983 so three of them had gone on before and a guy named Larry Fleming was the genius behind that. He had been at Valparaiso and he had also been at Concordia as a director of one of the choirs up there. But he had this idea that you could, because of Central Lutheran Church (which is just a magnificent structure), that they could maybe do something unique at Augsburg. So I was basically in on the ground floor, three years had gone before but there were only 2 services, maybe even one at one time, and people were just starting to get the word about it. There was a lot of movement with the choirs around the space but then the liturgy became a very important part of it. Developing a theme was one of my challenges along side the people directing the choirs or in charge of that aspect of it. They had many choir directors usually involved but we saw it grow to three, and then to four, and now to five services. Because we have a theme, using that setting and really focusing on and allowing the gospel to speak, called by the gospel again, I just have seen countless number of people who have really understood the gospel in different ways, in new ways. So many people, so many pastors and choir directors called me and asked, "Can I use this reading?", "Can we use this for our Christmas service?" and things like that because this is the first weekend in December. That was really something that I was always doing as I was reading and looking for things that I could use to kind of tie things together with the 13 music as we develop the theme. That was a pure joy and maybe hopefully that's part of a legacy too because it's real easy to have a concert--most colleges have a concert--but this is a service. Many people wanted to have a concert but it's a service. It still is a service. And when you speak about legacy I think you look at Augsburg and it's because of the legacy of so many amazing people who I knew about in high school--just because you hear Augsburg College and you heard about names that went along with that. Probably more so than any other college, it's that relation ... when you hear about St. Thomas, maybe you hear the same thing, but I think Augsburg is unique with the names that have built the place and just the traditions and just the connections. One of the other persons I just heard from this week is a doctor who with her husband, who is also a doctor, and with another group of doctors are establishing a whole health system in Burundi. They had to learn the language and they just felt called to do that. They are really making a difference in this world. It is just amazing to see how people have really impacted the world and maybe it would have happened in another place but I think it was Augsburg and just kind a sense of what you should do with that education allows people to do those sorts of things. 1.00.47 JM: That's a nice summation. Anything else? 1.00.53 DW: The Bunch of Guys Chorus. That's still going strong and people love it and that's created a lot of . . . 1.01.02 JM: Tell me how that started. Was that your idea? 1.01.05 DW: Well, so often at athletic events you'll have a soloist who sometimes may not realize ... they might forget the words or they might try to make a performance out of it, or they play a tape. And one day, 25 years at least maybe more, I thought to myself, it's real privilege to sing the national anthem. Why don't I just invite, especially because I was doing male athletic events, any guy in the audience who wanted to do that. Now I had set this up so I'd have a few good singers and pretty soon a lot of people who had never sung in their life came and joined us and just the thrill of singing the national anthem is amazing. 1.02.04 JM: Do you sing along with music? 1.02.09 DW: It's two part music, and I bring them down and they come around me. On the football field they go down on the field with a remote mike. Then at basketball and wrestling they just come and surround me at the table but it ... we've had as many as 200 guys (that would be a record) but you know usually it's a dozen guys or something like that, you know for football it would be more than that. But it's a powerful thing and it's really--especially for veterans who have served the country to be able to do--is really a neat thing to see. And for younger ones that join in, they have a sense of the magnitude of what a national anthem is about. 1.03.10 JM: Do you still do that? 14
Show less
- Title
- Transcript of Oral History Interview with Robert "Bob" Stacke, 2015
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Search Result
-
Interview Transcript
CC - The following interview was conducted with Robert Stacke on behalf of the Public
History 300 class's oral history project for the Augsburg College archives. It took place
on March 14,2015 at Augsburg College. The interviewer is Caitlin Crowley. So you can
just star...
Show more Interview Transcript CC - The following interview was conducted with Robert Stacke on behalf of the Public History 300 class's oral history project for the Augsburg College archives. It took place on March 14,2015 at Augsburg College. The interviewer is Caitlin Crowley. So you can just stare your background and education and the daGs. RS - Okay, so my background is that I went to Augsburg College 66-71 and got my bachelors degree in music and came back and did music education for 1971 and then taught for a bunch ofyearc, werfi to Saint Thomas, got my masters. Taught for a bunch of years and then went to the U and got my doctorate. And in between I always played drums and sometimes stopped teaching and played drums at different places in Maracaibo and Symphony Orchestra and Chanhassen Dinner Theater but I've always liked to teach, so that's my backgrormd. Always music. CC - Tell me about your time as a student at Augsburg RS - It was a fi.rn time. I had a good time. CC - What drew you to shrdy at Augsburg? RS - The music program. I went to a camp at big sandy lake, a music camp, when I was in eighth $ade. One of the faculty members was a pianist. We did Rhapsody in Blue and from then oq I was coming to Augsburg. CC - What was Augsburg like when you went there? Do you remernber the name of the p,resident ofthe college or some ofyour professon' names? RS - Oh sure, of course. Charlie Anderson was the president of the college then and he was a great guy and, Oscar Andersoru excuse me. And he was super personable and always engaged with the students. Kinda at the forefront ofa lot of different issues. Then it was more a gender issue than racial issues but he was always at the forefront to get more equality between men md women. A wonderfirl sense of humor, the president. Could raise money. He loved the arts. He was just a fantastic guy. I had a lot of interaction with him and totally enjoyed him. The school then, yea[ it was a tumultuous time during the 60s and I think Augsburg really fred well. It was a place of good values and ideals and charging ahead. They did a lot. CC - Did your family background draw you to Augsburg College? A lot of pmple who went to Augsburg were Norwegian or Lutheran in background. RS - Na[ none ofthat. My mother's from Australia. My dad was a merchant sailor...met her in Aushalia, went back to sea She came over here. After two years ofnot seeing hinl and they got maried. And I'm the son of a sailor. So yea[ my heritage is IrishAustralian. CC - Not at all Norwegian or Lutheran. RS - Not even close. CC - So you graduaed with a degree in music education. What kinds of classes did you take? RS - Basically the same thing that we have the students do now. You have your core curriculum with theory, music history, per:formance studies, and playing in ensemble and then all the gen. edsjust history and I had Don Gustafson who I adorcd. CC - Was he a history professor? RS - Yeah uh huh. CC - What kind of history did you take? RS - World hisory. And he just rctircd last year with me but he was around a lot longer than I was. He was a geat guy. But he was a wonderfrrl teacher and I remember him very, very well. We had really dynamic folks I remember all of my English teachers and music teachers and all the sorts of things that we did in the deparhnent. And the curriculum in the music deparhnent really hasn't changed much. Its standard fare across the world, really. The core curriculum. And I think one of the things that was really interesting here was tlla;t jan was the taboo music. And the world. Because it was the devils own music or you just made it up and everything, so the better things I did as a student and a teacher is we started a jazz band when I was a shrdent here. Ilwasn't really sanctioned. We had to practice in the middle of the night and we'd find ways into the music building, which was an old chrrch in those dayg to practice. Wrote our own music, which is fantastic. It was one of those things that was forced on us because there was no budget for music and so we wrote our own and the bmd director at the time Mayo Savold really championed us and la us perfomr on tlrc band concert. So we started kind of a jezz program here and some singers like we have with our jive or gospel praise singers and Jim Lindstrom was a choir mernber and he did the vocal and I did the insfumental and then when I came back we put it all back together again. We built i! and im really proud of the jazz program. CC - What were some of those people's names just so.. . RS - Oh the band director was Mayo Savold. M-A-Y-O Savold, and the actual rehearsal room is named after him, and Lee Sateren, Leland Sateren was the departsnent chair and theory teacher. He's the one I mid that played at that music camp. Small group of people but very influential on so many ofus. CC - So you think slowly people started to accept jazz a little more as a valid form of music at Augsburg? RS - Yealu it took forever. Like, when I first started lrcre to get jazz history it took forn times through acadernic affairs committee because they didn't thinl they couldn't see how that was diverse or worthwhile music. And this was, I'm talking, 25 years ago so all those people ae long since not here but it was a real battle to get that kind of music into the curriculurn. CC - So was that difficult for you as far as study abroad Fograms too, related ta jaz? RS - By then things changed really quicHy and it's never been a barrier, in fact it's been a plus now. We feel that we forged ahead. Like, for instance there was this thing called a music educators association and I was president ofthe jaz association of it. Well they let me come in but I couldn't vote because jazz qzs5o'1 u legitimate music. I mean, for real, it was like, 'No you can come but you don't, you can't vote trecause you're a joz musician." CC - You're a citizen without suftage. RS - That's right. Oh yeah it was really ba4 some racial things too, just awfrrl because they associated jaz-z with African Americans and we really battled a long time with different things. CC - Do you think that the college being diversified had anything to do with jazz being slowly accepted? RS - No, I think just the times. We were always a diverse camprts. Not to the extent that we are now but it would reflect the city pretty well. It wasn't a place where you just came and it was just all Norwegians or white folks. Even back then we wanted to have more diversity I remember always saying that we we should just look across the freeway here at groups of people and say we should be recruiting within our area And, of course, we do now. It was always a goal of Augsburg to become part of the crty and to show the diversity of the city. Even back then. CC So has Augsburg's music program always worked with people around the - RS - Yeah I think we did. At least in my experience. We would bning it guest artists like we have down here today like people from Cuba p,racticing and people over at cedar cultural center with all the Somali population. Back then it was more African American jazz musicians that we had contact with and we'd bring in some of the great players but I think we've always reflected our community well. I'm proud of this place. CC - Did you meet anyone at Augsburg that changed your life? RS - Yeah, my wife. CC - Okay, you should tell me about, like how did you meet your wife here? RS - Band. CC - In band? RS - Yeah, stre was a drummer too. CC - Oh I didn't know that. RS - Yeah. So, yep we met in band. I was a couple years older. She right out here on the comer right outside my office. So we juS dafed and got married the first week after graduation. CC - Wow. And how long have you been married now? RS - Forty yearq something? Yes. CC - So you alrcady told me a little bit about this but can you tell me how Augsburg was different than it is now? RS - You know. That's a searching question because I've always just felt a part of a continuum here and I think its evolved in so many good directions faster than a lot of things have evolved and I've always found that a place of values within having people when I recruit and when I went here and when I brag about the school and its are you a Lutheran school and yes we are a Lutheran school but everybody feels welcome here and I would my that even in the chapel, yeall we have religious ceremonies in the chapel but I don't care, it's about values more than it is about a certain denomination or certain religion its that everybody should feel welcome in our chapel. The values system of Augsburg was wonderfirl when I went herre. I mean people were protected and I just - remember it would when people (were) partying too much or getting drunk or whatever...you know they'd take care of them it wasn't like oh look here's a narc you know or whatever and people for the most part took care of each other. And same thing with the social issueg if someone's being bullied or the racially discriminated against I always felt the community came together and said no we're not gonna tolerate that and I think the continuum is here and with curriculnm its the same thing. With the honors progftm becoming so prominent and such a good thing here at Augsburg there always was something like tbat but with the honors program I think it was continuum of getting a diverse body ofstudents in. And also our core students that really glommed onto different things. It hasn't changed that much it's changed with the times. It hasn't been stuck in the past. So it's a nice continuum. CC- OtL and you did talk about this a little bit too, what was the diversity on campus like compa.red to now? RS- Oh, it was less of course. Because the Twin Cities was a lot less diverse. And so again I'll go back and say that I think we always reflected the community. And so the diversity it was here it wasn't probably the big topic all the time and so it wasn't part of our mission staternent but it was just part of us. I remembet Malcom X when he was assassinated and Martin Luther King I mean that was a huge impact on Augsburg community, and saying this is a honible thing to happen and people banding together and supporting the Atican American here or trying to understand, what the situation was. And so yes, it's always been very welcoming and a diverse population. And there was a lot of things too with Native Americans back then too where we try to be more inclusive with the Native American population. They were just blocks away, so, yeah. CC- And did Native Americans so, that community became then while you were at Augsburg? RS- I think recognized. I don't remember if they were actively recruited or anything like that. But think again, the social services and our outreach programs I think they reached out to the Native American population because that was one of the prominent non-white populations at the time. And of course the immigrants were more Norwegian than they were Somali or East African so, I think that's really int€resting that this neighborhood has always been an immigrant neighborhood and now it's East Africa rather than Scandinavian, and it's really cool. CC- Yeah that is. I had no idea that there was a huge Norwegian population here. RS- Oh around here? Oh yeal1 and musically it was all these fiddle players. CC- Really? RS- Ohyeah. CC- Wow, did you have the fiddle playing in school or not? RS- No it was mostly just in the commrmity, you'd get all these Norwegian dancers and bands and all that sort ofthing around andCC- That's cool. RS- Yeah it was. And yeah then we had, the Norwegian roots were much more prominent then because I think more Norwegians went here but rhen we had lutefisk at Christmas, we had all that stuff we'd have in the cornmons. You might want to gag but it was still there and so the Lutheran thing was big... but still very encompassing of the community. CC- So you think the changes that have happened to Augsburg are positive or negative? RS- Oh I think they're positive. I thinll I think just... people are people. And if you're thinking of the diversity issue it shouldn't matt€r, it just, everyone should feel welcome here and think they do. I think that's very important. I think academically, we go in cycles. And we need to c,oncenhate- that this is a college of higher education and really continue to shive to have excellent acadernic programs. Without that I think everything else suffers and goes away. And I think there has to be something that's academically rigorous all the time so people feel proud of the degree they get not just social or the wealth ofoutreach programs we have it has to be academically very proud too. CC- So do you guys have several diflerent majors in the music deparbnent? RS- We have five. CC- Five? And has tlnt been like that since you've- and more RSi- Uh uh. No. CC- Which ones were added? RS- When I was here it was basically music education... just a BA, and it was kind of perfomrances and since, well, with me as cbair we added music business. Music education became very shong. Music therapy was added with Roberta Kagin which was quite a while ago I think we're going on the fortieth anniversary of music therapy. So we have five degree programs, we have a BA, a degree in performance, a degree in music educatio4 a degree in businesq and a degree in... did I say education, or? CC- Yeah I think so. RS- So we have five. CC- Ok. And you said as chair you helped add several ofthose? RS- Yeah the business one for sure. CC- The business one. Great. RS- And the curriculum has really diversified in that we have abig jaz.z studies prograrl we have snall combo groups that celebrate contemporary music or rock, which I'm, that put in and I'm very proud of that because think that music education should encompass not just your classical or band geeks, you know, and I mean band geeks with affection because I'm the band director, or was. And music education has to accompany everybody and all styles and you can teach all those elements of music in a nontraditional way. CC- Ok so you helped add a lot of smaller bands. RS- Yep. CC- Oh great. So can you name a couple of those again I missed... RS- Ob just like contemporary ensembles we started three years ago, which would be rock bands and things like that and then we have a group now that accompanies a lot of Somali artists over at the Cedar Cultural Center and that's a mixture of alumni and current Augsburg sfudents and then as different Somali artists come in we rehearse with them, put on performances at Augsburg and at the Cedar Cultural Center and now we're starting to branch out and work on a presentation in Chicago and things like that so. Not for sure, but we're hoping it'll come tbrough. CC- What's the language barrier like with people... Somalian population or others? RS- It's so much fun. Because, you get together and the language becomes somewhat of a challenge but what's fun about it is that we have, we just talk in music. And they don't read music, they do everything by ear. We're the opposite, we do everything by writteru so you're combining musical leaming styles, plus language barriers, so you're singing back and forth, finding all new ways of commrmication...and it's a ball. And it's so fun, and it works. We just laugh about it... because... nobody cares, and language doesn't matter. It comes across really well. I I CC-Wow. RS- Yeah it's just an amazing situation. And culturally, we're so proud of this because you've go! you get different genders, and whicll and so in the cultrnes (this) is a big deal, especially Somali culturc... and that's breaking dovm, where women arc now, cafl sing, and they're not ostracized because they're singing a song. They can become musiciang so they're grormdbreaking in that area. To us thBt's just '.of course,', but as we leamed in Cuba, you're (women) not even supposed to play drums in some cultures. CC- Yeah. RS- Same \ing within the Somali culture, but that's breaking down, you have all these white folks playing with Somali's and nobody cares. It's just... we're making music, and it's a really fantastic thing. So it's a fusion of cultures, and music styles. We're learning so much from each other. CC- Are they ever surprised that these people arc interested in their music, or t}at they're ... able to play their music? RS- I think they're delighted. And at first it was like, *Oh my gosh, what's going to happen here? And as we rehearsed and werything they understood how much we're anjoying the music, and want to learn the music, and are infusing some of our jazz and R&B lines into their music which fils perfectly because their shrff is like Bob Marley meets Malaysia meets East Africa meets a little bit of R&B and hiphop. It's just this wonderfrd mixtrre of creolization of 516 many art forms and.. . they're excited about what we're doing. CC-Awesome. RS- It is. CC- Just going to make sure these (microphones) ae still working. They are. Hooray! Ok so I apologize, some of these (questions) are sort of repeats, but... tell me about your time as a professor at Augsburg, and the dates. RS- Yeah, I started here in 190, and I'm sill going I'm just not firll time anymore. I got sick a year ago and had a forcibly... the doc said you better Sop, so I did. And so, bnt I'm still teaching a class in Cuba, administering a grant, and doing different things here, different projects. So faculty, not frrll time anymore. CC- So tell me a little bit about the projects that you're doing now at Augsburg. RS- A lot of it's what we were just talking about. The Somali connections, whe're I put bands together for the Somali rtists... helping with some music education and things with some of the grad students where we're fying to do a zustainable project with some of our commrmity. In other words... training people in seminars, maybe classroom settingq and we're talking like high school students where they leam a skill like stage We don't think there's one pemon from East Africa that is a light p€rson, a sormd person, or any type of stage production, so we came up with the idea and we met with the Mirmeapolis schools, Bill Greeq who used to be superinterdant, and we came up with this ide4 Steve Herzog, who was in the gmduate program, that we tain anybody that wants but really trying to target more of the folks that, tom East Africa, and how to do recording technology, lighting technologies, just being a stage manager, all the things that (you) need to do to put on a production. And it doesn't have to be theatrical, it can be a musical So, they're leaming music, they're leaming these skills, and hopefully can get employment. So that's what- yesterday- I did. CC- Great. RS- Yeah. And ofcourse I love my Cuba class. CC- What brought you to... Augsburg to teach? I know that you taught at a couple other places before you taught at Augsburg. RS- I taught public school for almost seventeen years- Minneapolis, Bloomington and Hopkins. then I was at Saint Cloud for a couple years and I kept going to school and getting more of my degrees, and I've always wanted to come home... back to Augsburg. And I.., going dou,n the questions here... a position opened up and I applied, and it was a part-time position, and I got the job. And then it became a tenure track position and I had to reapply and go through the whole search process again. Kept the job, and I've been here ever since. Got t€nure, so, yeah. CC- Nice, was that a difficult process, or.. .? RS- It's nerve wracking. Yeah because you have to, it's hard because you have to convince people that you're worthwhile and fhat's, in a way, humiliating, and in another way it's an opportunity, so it's a really hard thing to find that balance. Yeah, it's a good pmoess. It's very good because you'rc judged by your peers, you're judged by the administration, and then outside folks so I think it's very fair. And it gives quality education to you guys. CC- How did you become the chair of the music deparfnent? RS- About fourteen years ago Merilee Klernp was chair, slre needed to go back to school, and I was elected, and reelected and reelected. .. CC- Do you have to be reelected wery... how many years? RS- Let's see, six years. CC- Six years, ok. RS- That's how we did it. CC- So are you still chair of the music department then? RS-No. CC- Who's chair now? RS- John Schmidt. CC- John Schmidt? RSi- Yeah. CC- Ok. Ahight. What responsibilities did you have as chair of the music departrnent? RS- I think it's really just getting all the ideas of everyMy together and trying to have a dernocracy where people decide on how to implement their ideas, and the challenge there is of course everybody has lheir own ideas but I think that kind ef thing is good. You don't want everybody to agee on everything because it's gonna be a one-track departnent. So when you have discussion or people feeling very passionaGly about something, it's great if we can dl air it together and come to a nice compromise or a conclusion to it. And you assign classes to peoplq you hire all the adjuncts, and here we always, I would be the main person, but I always open up to anyone in lhe faculty lhat wanted input. So, and now we have a mastersr. That's another fting I did with Roberta Kagin, we put the masters of music th*py iru and that's another degree program we have. CC- Is that the only even higher level class you guys have? RS- Yes. CC- Or sorry, degree. RS- In the music departnent. Oh our music ed kind of but it's not a masters in music education it's a masters in education with an emphasis in music. CC- I see. Ok. Ahight. From your experience being a teacher, what do you think makes Augsburg unique? RS- I think we can be really progressive. And I'm proud of our deparment in that it's progressive in curiculum. That we have your traditional, your classical traditional musicwhich you have to have, it's mandated to get acs€ditation and everything like that, but at the same time we celebrate music from everyrvhere and all styles of music. So you can be a classical singer, but at the same time tum around and sing in a rock band or a gospel group, or play jaa or play charnber music. We have, I thinh an incredibly wide base curriculum where we celebrate all people's styles and ne€ds. CC- Nice. And when you were a student did you feel the same way or was it different? RS- Oh, it was very traditional. cc- ok. RS- YealL and... right down the line. And when I was a student- I'm a dnrmmer- and they had no idea what to do with me. Because nobody- they had never had a drum person as a major in the school. And so for recitals and stntr, they had no idea what I was supposed to do. CC- They didn't know how to test you on anything? RS- No, no, because. no, it was great. And so I studied with Elliot Fine who was in the Minnesota Orchestra. So they said, "Bob, go study with him," and... I had a lot of chances to play here and show what I could do but yea[ it was kind of interesting. It was fun. Now of course, they can't pull that on me, so when I go to recitals, I know what they'rc supposed to do. CC- Did they have you leam any other instruments? RS- Ob, sure. For music education you have to have a working knowledge ofjust about werything. CC- Wow. And did they make you learn how to play werything or jus kind of leam basic knowledge? RS- Oh you have to lern to play a little bit of a brass instrument, a valve instnrmen! a trombone. . . violin was... yes. We still do lhat to everybdy. You have to have a working knowledge of strings, brass, percussion, because howCC- Which ones did you learn? RS- Oh I did trumpet, violin, Something from each family. CC- Ok. And what was yolrr favorite part about being a teacher? RS- Oh, the students. Yeah, and interaAing with the students, and trying to help thern make their dreams come tnre, md listening to what they think should happen. It's because it's your time noq it's not the firture, it's now for you grrys. And so, yeah, it's the students. That's what I miss, t€xribly, about not teaching every day is coming in and seeing everybody and interacting with students. It's actually very sad for me. hard. CC- Well at least you still get to be here part time, right? RS- Yeah. CC- I'm really int€rest€d in the shrdy abroad trips you've taken too. Obviously I went on one of those study abroad trips with you" so tell me about the study ab,road tips you've taken. RS- Oh yea[ I was, I've been really lucky trcause many years ago- 1993... 1990 something in there the dean sai4 *Bob, you should teach an interim class," and I sai4 *Yeah, if it's in the Caribbean " they go, *Go for it!" So we came up with a program ttrough this thing called U-may, Augsburg didn't have as much short-term study abroad then, and so we put together this program in Jamaica. And so it was 21 to 23 days long, and I did that nine times I thirik? CC- Wow. Nine years in a row? RS- Every couple of years... So it was a consortiurn, it was really our consortium of schools. It was Saint Thomas, Saint Kates, Saint Bens, Saint Johns, Bethel, and... ACTC schools, and I mean, it'd fill overnight. clarineL kty 32:26 CC-Wow. RS- And so, it was a wonderfirl prcgram. lVe'd study Caribbean music. We'd go to Bob Marley's recording studio and we saw a lot of people there... really fun stuff. CC- What was the class called? RS- History of Caribbean Music in Jamaica. cc- ok. RS- Hasn't changed much. CC- But it was a focus on the Jamaican rnusic? RS- Sure. And more broad than what we did in Cuba because we had three weeks and so we really probably... lots of emphasis on Jamaican music. We leamed a lot of different music of the differcnt islands and styles of music. I think the big telling thing that we talked about on our tip was just the recording thing. I think we could do a whole timeline of things tlnt I brought down for people to listen to the music on. I remernber first bringing a big boom box with a cassette tape in it- not eight track bu! you know- and a cassette tape, and trying to find power outlets and doing this and that and getting the huge speakers and getting it through (customs) and it was an amazing situation, and then those got smaller and better and start getting CDs, I mean we didn't even have CDs when I started doing the Jamaican thing. And so I'd get the CD player and I'd put the CDs in and I'd have to bdng a big thing of CDs, because you couldn't bum thern in those early times. So I rhink you know, and then we went to more phones, and then thene would be a huge doc for those, and cords you'd have to put in on the speaker, and so it was all that. And that was like, tlnee, four years ago. And now youjust bring your phone, and a... CC- A portable speaker RS- A portable speaker like we used and... there you go. It's fantastic. I really would love to do that visual thing ofthe first ones I bnrought down. CC- So is that the only, the only place you went or did you go to other study abroad trips? RS- The only ones- Yes, I led a trip to northem Ireland where we studied peace and reconciliation and tlnt was like six weeks. CC- When was that? RS- 2002 I think? cc- ok. RS- Or maybe a little earlier. cc- ok. RS- No, 2003 we went to Cuba, so it was- tlrat was my first trip to Cuba. But it was in there. cc- ok. RS- Yeah, bnt like 2000 something like that. CC- And what was that like as far as music educatioq or was it just- was it a music class or a different kind of class? RS- With errphasis on music, and what was interesting was studying the music of the troubles between northem Ireland, Irreland, and England. And it goes back a thousand years. And I found old, ancient books that had the lyrics of hate at the time and between denominations of the same religion which nobody could quite understand and it would go through this whole... And I'm talking about songs hundreds of years ol4 would start off with the romanticism of a revolution. we can relate this to cuban trips, we can relate this to Nicaragu4 and the idealism of revolution the way you want a great outcome, and then the realities of revolution where people dig and how do you reconcile that, is it wortltwhere does thuggery come into it. We see in so many places now, people start with an idealism, and then thugs come in and riot and loot and really you could ask them why are you here? Because it's fim? I mean I'm ov€rdrama(tizing)... but there's a lot of that and I think the thuggery and the same thing is happening in the Mddle East. Some of the idealisn is good but people just go crazy and do horrible things. CC-Right. RS- And so, the same thing happened with Sandinistas and all that in Cuba, their revolution, the idealism was grcat but the reality of killing people. And so the music would reflect all tlnt and tlrcn we would go to sites and study what we hearrd" and we had a lot of guest speakers. There was a group I can't rernernber the name- but they were (from) northern Ireland and they had sang a lot of protest songs against the British, and three out of the six were assassinated for their music. And so I interviewed the three of them that were left and then came to... a lot of the study was people of revolution have a lot of music. But the people in charge have very little. CC-Wow. RS- And you know, and that's a sweeping generalization because you could say we have a nationalistic period of'\rave the flag" country western music and all that sort of thing and other cormtries have the same thing but for that sort of thing at those periods of time, it seems the revolutionaries have a lot more music than the people in charge because they don't want to admit to something terribly wrorg intemally. A civil war, revolution. So we studied that. CC- That sounds like a fabulous trip. RS- It was, yeah. CC- I would love to go to Ireland. RS- Yeah. It's a great place. CC- So, you took a trip... You've been to Ireland, to Cubq to Jamaic4 and you said Nicaragua as well? RS- Yeah. CC- Was that also a history of Caribbean music class? RS- No that was just something I went on with CGE, I didn't take students, but there was some students that we met and worked with so, so basically it's been Jamaica Ireland study abroad. And then with our ensembles we've been all over the world. CC- Oh yeah, I'd like to hear about that as well. You've taken trips with the Augsburg bands RS- And choirs, and orchestras. CC- Oh ok Yeah tell me a little bit about those trips or where they were, or anything you'd like to tell me. RS- We've really been all over the world. It's fantastic. The band has been to Norway, Ireland, England, and the last hip was to Turkey, the one before tlnt Romania... and performed, 61d agaiq the choir- same thing. China, most of east- west€fli, most of eastern Europe. CC- Wow. RS- All over the world. Literally. And it's been fantastic because again just like the things with the concerts here you find that people are all the same. And they want to celebrate music, we want to celebrate love, we want to celebrate our lives, we juS wantninety nine percent of the world is quite normal, it's the- and we nwer hear about iq we hear about that one percent that's nuts and abnormal that deshoys things for everybody else. Most of us want the same thing. And just kind of leave us alone to do what we want and live our lives. CC- And play music. RS- And play music. An4 and so I think all those trips are fantastic. Because we try to interact with student musicians from all those countries. So yea[ it's been a wonderfirl thing to be able to go on these hips. CC- That's wonderfirl. And I know it's hard to pick a memory, or can you tell me any of your favorite countries, any funny stories or anything. RS- think for countries, it's always the unfamiliar like. It's the ones that just unexpected \ings (are) gonna happen. I think Romania was wonderfirl that way because it's- it's just coming out of really a dark time, it was one of the last cormtries to get rid of commrmism, the celebration of life is fantastic. So those type of place, Estonia was the same, we went with the choir, we went in the period where the Russians had really jus given them their independence after the fall of the wall and stuff, and the celebration of independence was fantastic. So I think that sort of thing for me, it's always the unfamiliar tlnt I really like to go towards. CC- Yeah. How did the study abroad trips differ from the trips you took with the band? RS- Not perforrnance. For me, the sfudy abroad without perfonnance are a lot less stressfirl. Because you're not worried about acoustics, you're not worried about getting homs there, you're not worried about wear the uniforms or the dresses or this or that, and are people getting sick- mean you always care but it's hard when you lose an instrumentalist, they can't per:form or sing so it's a lot less shessfirl. And bu! on the other side, is that when you have a group of non-performerg you see it in a whole differelrt light and hear it in a whole different light, because I think the non-perfonners hear music different thnn the performers. It's more of an emotional response than an emotional, analytical rcsponse. It gives an honesty to it tlnf I leam so much from- you guys- and things like that. CC- So the people that play inshuments arc mone methodical about how they see the otherRS- I think so, and I'm the same way, because we're so trained that oh listen to this- this is in tune, does the melody fit the rhythm, is- what key is it in, and how are they articulating it, is it accurare, all these rhings we're tained to do. And we sometimes miss the message of the music. CC- Right. lVould you guys ask- would the teachers ask the people more emotional type questions? Intemrption here- Peter Hendrickson opens door. RS- Oops, hi. PH- I didn't think you were here. I was gonna ask- see ifthe bus was here. RS- You have a gr€at tour. PH- Thank yoq " ^nk you. We will. Sorry. CC- It's ok. RS- We're just dorng an interview thing. You know, this is my first tour... you know Peter, this is my first trip without going with you in twenty some yearc. I I I PH- I know. RS- It's really sad. PH- I know. RS- But have a great trip. CC- What's the trip? PH- The choir tour. RS- The choir tour. CC- Ob have fim. Peter Hendrickson leaves. RS- Yeah, firs tip I haven't gone on in twenty years. CC- Aw. Where are they going? RS- Iowa. CC- Iowa ok. Let's see. Do you have any... let's see. Tell me about your favorite, or one ofyour favorite mernories tom a band trip. Or a study abroad tip. Or both. RS- Yeah. . . I think a lot of it is when people and both things aren't tourists but travellers, and then like our group that wexrt to Cuba. Everybody was trying to understand the culture. We weren't looking at werything like we were perpetually in a box looking at little figurines out there, we tried to becorne part of the culture or rmderstand the culture. And not being tourists, we were really travellers. And I think tlnt's the best memories of the groups like that. I think performance wise sometimes you have a magical space like with Peter and his choir we w€re in Estonia... Yes it was in Estonia we were in an old church, no ceiling, and then we found out... And there was boxes of skulls and bones. And we found out that this was a place that Nazis has murdered and deshoyed the church when they were leaving and then the Russians did the same thing, so this place was just pounded. And they sang a concert that was so ernotional because it was in memory of those people that lost their lives because they just wanted to be free. And they got it coming and going- they got it by the Nazis and they got it by the Russians, so that is an incredible mernory to me. CC- That is really anrazing. So tell me about why you decided to retire. RS- Oh that was... I had no intent on retiring, and then I had some heart trouble and had surgery and they said I'd better stop... working fiilItime to take care of myself. So that's the gis of ig and it's been hard because I didn't prcpare myself for not being part of Augsburg. It just happened, like overnight. Literally. So, yeah, it's been really tough. So, but teaching these classes and being here doing things like this. CC- Right... what year was thafl Was that this year that you becameRS- A year ago. So yeah, it would have been last official firll time day was August of 2014. So it's just been six months. CC- Ok. And... well you've told me a little bit about this already, a lot about it actually... Tell me about your current musical projects. RS- Otr, it's really fun. And like I said, I'm working with the Cedar Cultual Center and Augsburg and on these Somali groups that come in. We do perfonnances with therq depending on their needs. Sometimes it's a full ban4 sometimes it's a srraller group. We have five of those that we were doing in the course of this year and a hal! so we have two left. And musically, I just came from a rehearsal. It's a repertoire orchestra where we were playing some vivelias and MC Korsakofr and I'm playing and travelling as much can. But musically keeping very active and playing and the grant's keeping me very happy here. Yeah. CC- So do you... do you play usually when you... or do you direct these groups? as I RS- These groups for Augsbqg I usually direct. Or play like auxiliary percussion. We have such fine people here, they slrould be playmg not me. But like if it's not Augsburg then I play. CC- Ok. So you applied for a grant to do this? RS- Yeah, Doris fhrke. Huge- it's called Building Bridges. CC- Doris Duke? RS- Duke. Of D.rke University and Drke tobacco... was the big tobacco baron and trying to do some good wilh her money. And so she has all these educational things, and this is to promote Muslim cultre through music. And of cornse that's a dichotomy because a lot of people think Muslims don't like music. mean we're talking about these generalizations, here's this huge grant that we're doing to promote Muslim culture through music. So it's proving most folks do like music. And things like that... So we get this gmnt and we vtrrote it two yees ago and the Cedar is the administrator of it and everything so it's in parhership with Augsburg. So I'm the Augsburg music connection. CC- Wonderfirl. RS- Yeah. CC- And... Just going to make sure everything is good and working still. Alright. And this is the final question. What do you consider your legacies at Augsburg? As a student, as a pmfessor... RS- I hope the students remember me well. I think about that. It's like, you know, my peers and my deparfneng and my students" and I think sometimes you get an email from twenty years ago and you just go "lhis is so cool." And then running into my colleagues in the departnent. I think that's the legacy: that I rcally tried to be a good teacher. And people would ask me, you've taught for forty swen years, why do you keep wanting to do it? And I said because I've never got it right. So it's a wonderfrrl challenge. And so that's how (I want to be) rerrembered. As a gmd teacher. CC- Well thank you so much for doing this oral history wilh me, I really appreciate iq and your answers were really awesome, so thank you so much. RS- Thank you. I
Show less
- Title
- Transcript of Oral History Interview with Donald "Don" Gustafson, 2013
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Search Result
-
Soldier’s Perspective of American Occupation of West Germany (Transcript)
Narrator: Don Gustafson
Interviewer: Chris McCollom
Chris-The following interview was conducted with Don Gustafson on behalf of the Minnesota
Historical Society for the Soldier’s Perspective of American occupation of ...
Show more Soldier’s Perspective of American Occupation of West Germany (Transcript) Narrator: Don Gustafson Interviewer: Chris McCollom Chris-The following interview was conducted with Don Gustafson on behalf of the Minnesota Historical Society for the Soldier’s Perspective of American occupation of West Germany for the oral history project. It took place on March 7, 2013 at Augsburg College. The interviewer is Chris McCollom Chris- Ok Gus, my first question is what brought you into military service. Don- Easy answer, my friends and neighbors. Because back in the 1950’s the military the draft was still there. I had just left graduate school with my master’s and the draft board quickly realized I was no longer in school which meant I lost my 2S classification. I don’t recall, I think it was in September they informed me I was 1A, in November they sent me off for a physical, and in February I was a soldier. Chris- And just to clarify what year was that in? Don- That was in February of 1957. Chris- 1957 Chris- And how did you feel about service initially? Don- I was damn mad because I was too important a person to have to waste two years of my life doing the monkey business that went with the military. I had heard very little good from buddies who had been in the military, it was a grind and all the rest. So I did not go in with the best of attitudes, on the other hand there I was, I wasn’t going to mope. Chris- Ok, um, so that seems like it was a pretty prevalent feeling among people. So what was your understanding of American occupation prior to arriving in Germany? Don- Come again with your question? Chris- What was your understanding of American occupation prior to arriving in Germany, what was kind of the feeling heading into Germany? Don- I guess I hadn’t thought about that, well ah I just knew that we had one heck of a lot of soldiers, military, in Germany after the second World War. I knew very little about what occupation actually meant and as I recall I got into the service in February, went through basic training, was blessed with being lucky enough to go to a splendid adjunct general school for sixteen weeks and then had a month in Texas with the outfit I was going to go with to Europe. I don’t remember getting any kind of orientation really. We may have gotten, except that last month, that month at Fort Hood was hell as far as I was concerned. Because I was new there, I didn’t know anybody and the whole outfit was trying to get ready to go, they were trying to get all of their equipment spit polished and as I recall, we were working into the night, into the evening, 9, 10, 11 o’clock…anyway enough of that. Chris- Alright Don- And then in November of 57, we landed in Europe and were sent to a small casern, or fort, which was on the outskirts of Nurnberg in southern Germany. Chris- Ok, and that’s where you stationed for the duration of your service? Don- I was there for the rest of my, uh and I remained in the service. Technically, I was permitted to leave in February of 1959 but for various reasons I agreed to stay on for 3 more months and so I was separated from the service in May of 1959. Chris- Alright and what kind of orders were you given on arrival? Was there clear communication of what you were supposed to be doing Don- Uh, well yes and no. I mean I knew what I was supposed to be doing, I had been assigned to be on the personal staff of a one star general who was the commander of the artillery of the 4th armored division and I worked with him for then for about not quite a month, uh and so my job kind of, was doing what he asked me to do. You know, office work and so forth and, uh, you know I, I don’t remember exactly though clearly we had a bunch of officers that were, came over to Germany with us. Many of them, some of them, had never been in Germany, some of them had been, perhaps, before but, uh, they were very tense as if the Russians might attack us tomorrow, we got to be ready. And they were also very much attuned; we can’t, we got to be careful not to insult the Germans and jumped at all sorts of little things just because they didn’t sense the situation. A year later it was a lot easier to be with them because they weren’t as uptight. For example, we had a service club on the casern, it was a very small casern I suspect, maybe, fifteen hundred guys at the most. We had a service center that was a recreation place that was run by, well I don’t know who, I suppose by the army but there were civilians running it. I know one night those of us who were over there, to keep us busy, they suggested we should create a newspaper and uh, of the news of the day and so on. And somebody wrote an article about the Germans and their honey wagons. None of us knew what honey wagons were until we got to Germany. The honey wagons were simply the manure spreaders of the day. I suspect what was happening. We had manure spreaders at home but these, there was enough moisture and liquid that they were sort of in containers and there was a slight aroma about them. Most of the guys in our outfit that I knew were city guys, they weren’t used to the smells of farm. So there was a cute article about the Germans and their honey wagons. Well the next day one of the officers in the casern happened to see a copy of this and he went bananas because if a German were to see that he would be so insulted and blah blah blah and it was that kind of stuff we lived with, at first. I haven’t thought about those honey wagons and that little business. Glad you came by and reminded me. Chris- So, then kind of another question off that, in my research I came across something called the four D’s: denazification, demilitarization, decentralization, democratization. Did any of your orders kind of revolve around that…that was all… Don- That was all governmental stuff or diplomatic, um, not that I recall anything of that. I never heard of those four d’s before, sounds like historians were working on it afterwords. And well next question. Chris- I guess you kind of already went over it but could describe a typical day during your service? Don- There were about a hundred guys who were in our headquarters battery as I recalled. In the fourth armored division, and armored meant it was basically tanks, there were four units that were artillery and two of those units each of which had about four hundred men were at our casern. Then our battery, which was the headquarters, and we were superintending all of these four groups, uh, was there. In one wing of the building, there were the offices. The general had his own office and I had an office adjoining it which I shared with the aide-de-camp. The day started with a miserable revelry, uh reveille, that we had, it was no revelry and we had to get outside and watch the flag go up even if it was so dark we couldn’t see the flag. This was Germany and Germany is far enough north and I don’t think it got light on winter mornings on 9 o’clock, maybe that’s an exaggeration, reveille was there. Went to breakfast in the mess hall and then I immediately went to my office and the general usually came in a bit after 8. I was there in the office, I left for lunch of course, but I can’t remember, I suppose I was in the office until 4:30 or 5 o’clock. I was clearly underworked in that the amount I had to do for the general was, well a minimal other than being a receptionist for people coming in to see the general. I guess I had to go and get his coffee occasionally and little things like that. The amount of correspondence I had to do for him was not great, some. I was lucky because since I was working for the general, nobody else dared come in and throw anything on me to do because it might interfere with what the general. I should also say, the general’s office was on one side of my little room and on the other side was the chief, what was his title, the assistant officer to the general who, he was a colonel, and my general had only one star so he was among…I was impressed to be working with the general, but among the army one star general’s were not that special. Let me also say I was lucky enough to be working with a fellow I never got close to him in the sense, at no point were we buddies or pals, but I certainly respected him and I clearly felt that he respected me. So we basically had a, what I would say, a good working relationship. I had a somewhat different situation with the aide-de-camp who was a west point bastard, immature and difficult. Fortunately he left after 4 or 5 months for something else and then the second aide-decamp was just a really neat guy that I did like and we worked together very well. I can also say, or best mention, that was office work. Because we were with a field outfit, meaning we were to be ready to fight when the time came, we at least once a month had what was called an alert which would come about 4:30 or 5 o’clock in the morning which meant we had to jump up, get clothes on and get ready to march out. And about every other month we would be told, and this time you don’t just stand there by your vehicle, you go on out and were told where we are to meet again. So we’d be out in the field, in the woods for the morning. Most of us hated that and then occasionally we would go out for, two of three overnight stays and in those cases my job was to, I never rode with the general in his car or his jeep, but once we got to the field I had to dig his personal latrine. So I became a prime latrine digger. Ok next question. Chris- I guess another question I have is, could describe your first impressions of the German populace and maybe their attitudes towards you and the rest of the American occupiers Don- By sheer chance I had been in Nurnberg a couple of years earlier, only for a few days, when I was on my way to India. In that sense it wasn’t totally new but I didn’t meet any Germans at that time and the Germans who were down there weren’t speaking English, generally, and they looked askance at us and we looked askance at them. We certainly had been informed that the Germans didn’t necessarily like us and in this little village of Zurndorf where our casern was located. Zurndorf was basically a suburb of the big city of Nurnberg, in this village it had few shops and a very fine eating place. A small eating place but on the door to that place, in very bright, clear letters, was a sign that said “No occupation troops”. We took that seriously for a while. Eventually some of us discovered that what that really meant was that they didn’t want us to come in there wearing our uniforms. If we came in in civilians clothes and ordered dinner, that was fine. But most of the guys in our outfit didn’t enter the Golden Lavel, they went up the street to a place I never I went into, which I’m sorry about now, which was a just an old fashioned beer joint where the whores hung out and amazingly called “Mom’s”. That’s where they went, not all of them but ok. As we were there for more months, you know, we just began to realize there just Germans, they’re the people who are here and I don’t remember any really antagonizing situation or so on. Eventually I got involved with a group in Nurnberg, of Germans who wanted to practice their English and we would meet one night a week and just talk about all sorts of things. Chris- Did your superiors kind of have the same attitude towards, were they lax with the german people or were they a little more… Don- It was very formal, they knew they had to be nice to Germans and not offend them and of course the Germans knew how to protect themselves. If for example an army jeep hit a chicken and killed it, the army would be then billed not only for the death of that chicken, but also for all the eggs that chicken might have produced in the next two years or three years and that kind of thing. A couple of the officers, for example, the aide-de-camp I mentioned as being the bastard, he got hooked up with a German girl and in a year had married her, I don’t recall ever meeting her. I’m not sure I wanted to. So there was that kind and of course, the guys I still remember, one of the first nights we were allowed off the casern and off the base when we got there. This bunch of guys from our battery went down to and heard about “Mom’s” place and they had found women and they came back and I can still hear “These women don’t shave under their armpits!” and German women didn’t! Chris- So I guess kind of going off that, you talked about the jeep hitting the chicken, was that kind of misconduct or accidents prevalent? Don- Not tremendously, we were pretty much warned about what we could do and couldn’t do. I suspect maybe I didn’t hear all things but I do know one of the fellows that I got to know a little bit, neat guy, I should mention in a way I didn’t see the real army because, well I did, the guys I was with after hours and so forth, most of them were guys with college educations who were going to become professionals one day. They weren’t 18 year olds, we had enough of those. I was 24 years old. Most of the guys I was with were similar age and well one of these guys, that I didn’t know terribly well, proved to be gay at a time when being gay was certainly not permitted. He ended up having an affair with a German fellow, roughly his own age, and the German fellow’s father found out about it and there was hell to pay over that. That probably would have happened anywhere, not just because they were Germans. Non-sequitur, we had one German friendship day a week I guess. We were supposed to bend over backwards to let the Germans know we like them and whoever planned it saw to it that one night, the officers were to go to the opera in Furt and furt was the city adjacent to Nurnberg. The general knew I’d like to go to a free opera and he saw to it I got a ticket and so on and that was very fine. Most of the officers I knew could care less about opera but they had to go and they were supposed to bring their wives and so forth. I can remember, of course the opera was in German, I don’t remember what it was, but somewhere in the opera these guys were trying to stay awake to watch and listen. At some point in some scene one of the characters “auf deutsch” two of the few words almost everybody learned, which was mach schnell (make speed) and all of a sudden “Mach Schnell!” and the whole audience just burst into laughter because finally they understood something. It was kind of, obviously, a formal affair. It’s kind of difficult when you’re given an assignment trying to like these people and the Germans, who were there, it was the mayor and some other officials who were probably as unwilling to be there. Anyway enough of that. Chris- You kind of touched on the Germans initial reaction, at least when you first got there.. Don- At least what we perceived Chris-Perceived, did that perception hold over time? Don- No, I quickly learned. I made German friends who, partly some of them wanted to learn English, some of the Germans liked to meet Americans because Americans would give them cigarettes and those sorts of things. And some of the guys in our outfit, who had wives, brought their wives over and they rented apartments on the economy and they lived down in the economy. I know the general, for whom I worked, had a very nice house that had been assigned to him and he had a soldier who was his valet for all practical purposes, taking care of his clothes and so forth. Al was a really neat guy and the general saw to it that Al could live out of the house. There was an apartment above the garage and I was invited to move in there. But I didn’t have a car and it was about 3 miles from the casern so I declined that. But there were fellows who lived off camp and there were a number who got into serious. Oh and I dated, well I guess I can use the word dated, a very attractive young German girl in the village who I met in this English language group. Her parents were highly suspicious of all this and even though I went to their house and met them, I realized they were fairly unsure of all of it, of what this was all about. In fact, they decided I wasn’t all bad when I invited her to be my date for that opera I talked about and that was proper cultural stuff. I don’t even remember her name now but she recognized that I was not about to propose to her and as I say she was cautious but about, and I can’t remember how long afterwards, but somewhere along the line I had a letter from her telling me she was getting married to an American officer that she had met. I don’t know anything more about it but look what I led her toward. Whereas there were some guys in our outfit who never left the base unless they had to. They were mad about being in the army, they were lonesome, they never got over that they weren’t back home in Kentucky. Ok, I’m not sure if that answered your question. Chris- That answered that and my fraternization question which seems it was pretty high between… Don- There’s another thing here. While we were there, a film was released about the Nurnberg trials and after the war German leaders were tried at Nurnberg and it was a major event that went on for months and a documentary was released somewhere, I suppose in the spring of 1958 and I was intrigued by it and I went to see it. I remember sitting there in that theater surrounded by Germans and all of a sudden it dawned on me: I was very obviously an American because Americans were picked out because we had to have military haircuts and Germans wore their hair long. We smelled different, I don’t know. I remember suddenly thinking what am I doing here, what if we got some real Nazi fanatics who are angry about what’s happened. Will I get punched on the way out and so forth? None of that ever happened, I was not aware of anything but it indicates that one had to be somewhat aware, suspect so forth, what might happen. Chris- I had a question about the Bundeswehr, the federal armed forces, that were formed in 1955. Did you ever have to interact with them? Could you describe that if you did? Don- Not very closely but usually in the spring of each year we had a major practice war and there would be for maybe a week or so and we would be out in the field living in pop tents and what not. I think the first year I was there was the first year the U.S. army cooperated with the German Bundeswehr, which they obviously should be doing if we have to fight together. I don’t remember if we had any German troops coming into our base but I was somewhat aware of what was happening with the Germans because this fellow Al who was the servant for the general. He was a German boy and had come to the united states and had agreed to be in the army because this would get him citizenship faster but Al came from a village 50 miles south of Nurnberg and he had a younger brother who was in the Bundeswehr and occasionally that younger brother would come and he’d be around or we’d hear where he was. I don’t remember any other, I’m sure the general was involved but when it came to those tactical things, I really wasn’t involved in finding out about things. I had to get a top secret clearance, I don’t remember ever getting close to anything that I would’ve considered secret but that was just one of the army rules and I passed. I hadn’t done anything to suggest I was unworthy of the job. Chris- You kind of mentioned earlier how you were always ready for the soviets in case there was an attack. Was that threat really taken very seriously? Could you describe the kind of feeling you had about East Germany? Don- Yes and we were not too far from the Czech border so we were frequently reminded. We were soldiers and soldiers were to be ready to fight. Ya know I don’t even remember if I had a weapon during those years. I know I had a weapon in basic training and so on. If I did have a weapon it didn’t amount to much, I have a typewriter I kept saying I had to throw. But I was due to get out of the military, to be separated I think about the 20th of May 1959. That was when my three month extension would expire and I think it was on the 10th of May or 8th of May something happened, I don’t even remember what it was, but all of a sudden there was real fear that we may be on the brink of conflict and so our outfit was ordered out to the field and we were located at a place where I don’t remember exactly if we could just look out and see across the border. I was quite aware that as our tanks, and men, and artillery and so forth were gearing up on our side, the Russians were doing it, or we assumed, were on the opposite side. Somehow I could not believe we were likely to go to war directly but I’d seen enough of our drunken sergeants to think it would be just like it for one of these goofballs to do something that looked provocative and fire his weapon at them and they’d fire back and we’d be into something by accident. That did worry me and I thought “Damn, could it be because I extended for three months could it be I end up being killed in conflict over here.” As it turned out it didn’t happen and I don’t remember how long our outfit had to stay in the field because when the 19th or 18th of May came along, I was shipped back to our casern. I packed up my stuff to leave, however one of the really nice things…the general knew, it was my last day in the office, that morning captain whatever his name was who was the general’s helicopter pilot came by. I was surprised because I knew that we had not laid him on to take the general on a tour like he often did. The guy came in and I said “What are you doing here?” and he said “Well Gus I came for you.” It turned out as sort of a farewell gift to me, the general had asked his helicopter pilot to give me a ride around the country side and I’d never been in a chopper before. I think we were up in the air for an hour and a half or so and it was tremendous fun because I was seeing villages and woods and so forth that I had only seen from the ground. Don-Well next question we must be close to 25 by now. Chris- Pretty close. Don- You didn’t think I was going to be this… Chris- No I was making sure, I figured you would be…um that’s a good thing. Chris- So did you ever have interaction with people from the other side, refugees coming over. Don-Nothing, I wasn’t aware of anything like that. Maybe it was occurring at some point, even though I was working with the general and, as I say, he wasn’t high up either. So, I did after leaving, after getting out of the service I stayed in Europe and I didn’t take off for the states until August sometime. I had several, couple, of months. Much of that time I was up in Finland at a camp. On the way from Finland I came back into Germany because the ship I was going to be on was from Bremerhaven and at that point I stayed overnight in Hannover I guess it was and then took a train into Berlin and spent the day or two wandering in East Berlin. This was so long ago, hell, the wall had even’t been built yet but, and then I was simply a tourist. Otherwise I have no recollection of any contact of that sort. Chris- Can you kind of describe what it was like being in East Berlin, because I think that was pretty interesting that you were… Don- Oh in East Berlin Chris- As opposed to the West… Don- I didn’t know except I just, I had my passport which I knew I better have with me and walked through Checkpoint Charlie with no trouble and simply wandered. I know I got into the museums, visited a church or two. We did go, I had traveled, this was in 1959. Five years before I had been, I had spent the summer in India with a group of Minnesota students, one of whom an incredible woman. Blonde, who had chosen the summer of 1959 to do a bicycle tour of Europe and we had arranged we’d meet. So we met, not in Hannover, in Hamburg we met. So she and I did Berlin and she absolutely left me terrified more than once, guts turned to ice because Joan, Joan was used to doing her own thing and more than once she’d say “Hey this is an interesting ruin I want to get a picture of it.” And I said “Joan!”. Because we heard about what could happen to people that might be doing things that the authorities… But I don’t remember a single moment when anybody, when any official, police and so forth, even looked daggers at us or anything. So, I do remember being rather jolted because we did get into East Berlin and changed some money because…and we found, ya know, we knew that the economic situation in East Berlin was not good. But hey their coins were so flimsy. I almost thought they were made of cardboard. They weren’t, they were metal. But there was so little metal in them that, uh, whereas the West German coins were good, solid coins. Those little indications, it’s another world. Well push me. Chris- Ok, um, so now looking back could you describe how you feel about the American approach to the occupation. Don- Well we had, it was assumed…come again? The American approach, what? Chris- Kind of how the American military approached, the way they handled the occupation or so forth. Don- I guess maybe I had been brainwashed well this is the way the army has to operate. I don’t remember, hmm, well I can remember being sometimes embarrassed. For example like that night at the opera when the officers around me were obviously klutzes, cultural klutzes and things like that. I had never thought of things in that direction, so let’s pass. Chris- Ok, let’s just finish up with… as your service came to an end, how did you feel? Like could you describe the emotions you went through, the experience you felt in Germany. How that kind of all…did you reflect at all at the end? Don- Well I was kind of sorry to leave in some ways. I was, I had a college education, I had read about these places, suddenly I’m there. You discover Europe is a place where everything seems to be on top of each other. If you had a car you could have breakfast in one country, lunch in a second country, and supper in a third country because you just moved around in that way. I didn’t get a car until just a few months before I separated from the service. But I did have friends who would have vehicles and our service club at the casern, every so often they did the kind of things that tried to get us out, on a Sunday afternoon, we’d go tour a place that had some historic interest. I felt I got around a fair amount, but the woman who I eventually married came to Europe just as I was leaving. She taught for the army, so she was a civilian so she wasn’t under the kinds of limitations I was. And the amount of traveling she and her fellow teachers did, just awesome. So and well I, it was just great fun being there and, oh, and the food. To get off base and eat German food, that was just so great. Some years later when Bev and I returned to Germany, for a few days, we both just laughed at ourselves because somehow we discovered all we wanted to do eat kartoffel and get those hard rolls, and it was the food! I didn’t make any long range German friends. I didn’t, I had acquatances and in a couple cases we maintained contact for a year or two. But, whereas my wife, she spent two years in a small town called Permisons and now 50 years later she still corresponds with people. But then she was a civilian. She didn’t have to be on the base when she wasn’t teaching and so on. She just had more freedom. You haven’t asked me this but for me, the army was my liberal arts education. In that I don’t think I had led a really sheltered life but I certainly got to know new types of fellows that I had never really associated with before. I had never had much work experience; I had a bit but not a great deal. But to see how power worked and I really left when I got back home I missed the army in some ways. In fact I even checked to see if I could get in to a reserve unit somewhere. I didn’t but, well there were certain things about the army that I liked, amazingly. And partly I was just, just this morning I was skpying with one of my closest buddies who was fellow I met when in the army in Germany and I was asking him something about Pinder barracks that I had forgotten about and amazingly even, at the time I sort of, got, wasn’t happy about being a soldier but this morning it was amazing his comments were very positive. He said it was really a good experience. Now if on the other hand Tom was just a very lowly clerk in, as to the, of his battery. Whereas I was a person of some prestige, I was the general’s secretary. You know when I was out wandering some of the lieutenants almost would salute me because “he know the general”. The assumption was that because I was his, well, who knows. But it was the aura of power. If I had been where Tom was I probably would have had a somewhat less glorified picture of army life. I’m, well, come on you must think up a question of your own. Chris- You’ve answered all of mine for the most part. Even without me asking some of them, you just answered them. Don- I ended the service, well I can’t remember when it was but I finally was promoted to a rank of E5 which was a specialist 3 as I recall, the equivalent of about sergeant but I was not called a sergeant because I, the kind of my responsibilities were not directing people. I think the only time I had any sort of command in the army was once I was told to see that these three fellows did a good job of cleaning the latrine. One of the things that the army in general did for me, Chris, is that ya know I grew up knowing I was a weakling. In grade school when we had recess and chose up teams, I was always the last one picked to be on a team because “Well ok I’ll take Gus”. Well I wasn’t, I didn’t give two hoots about it. So I just assumed but ok, but when I got into the military I wasn’t quite as weak as I thought I was. Basic training had some bad moments, hard moments but hey I did a heck of a lot better than lots of the fellows. I loved the obstacle course. I still remember the fun crawling in the mud on my elbows with my rifle while they were shooting blanks over us and barb wire in part because I was a farm boy. So that was, that was good. I came away very impressed with that the army knew what they were doing. Ya know I frequently said “oh my god” and yet boy I learned a lot. So I honestly am sorry for guys like you that you don’t have that chance at a military experience. While I’m not telling you go on out and enlist, I suspect if I had stayed in the army and spent my whole two years in Levenworth, Kansas I’d have a heck of a lot to forget. That one month at Fort Hood, longest month of my life. Partly because of the situation, partly because Fort Hood was such a hell hole, no trees. So do you think you have enough? Chris- I think, yeah, I learned a lot I think we got enough and we almost got to an hour. Don- Well let’s see Chris- No we’re fine on time, so… Don- I can’t, hmm, I do remember some very good moments, some pretty rough moments. I remember a couple of times we were called to go out for reveille and it was cold and I hid in my wall locker knowing it would be hell to pay if I’d been found, caught, those kinds of things. It was good for me; you know you people have had chances and experiences that I hadn’t up to that point but I had never had interaction with Afro-Americans. In the military I met a couple of really neat Afro-Americans with whom I connected. One of the fellows, who was among my closest buddies in Nurnberg, has become well known in church circles for his music. I would say three or four times a year I find myself at a church service or something and they’re doing a number by Hal Hobson. Well good enough guy. Chris- Thanks Gus, I appreciate it. It was enlightening.
Show less
- Title
- Transcript of Oral History Interview with Garry Hesser, 2015
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Search Result
-
Inteniew with Garry Hesser
Inteniewed at Augsburg College, Oren Gateway Center 106A
Minnerpolis, MN
Interviewed on March 4o 2015
Augsburg College Oral History Project
Interviewed by Heidi Heller
Please note that the
narator, Garry Hesser, requested
of additions and edits to the final
tran...
Show more Inteniew with Garry Hesser Inteniewed at Augsburg College, Oren Gateway Center 106A Minnerpolis, MN Interviewed on March 4o 2015 Augsburg College Oral History Project Interviewed by Heidi Heller Please note that the narator, Garry Hesser, requested of additions and edits to the final transcript before it was approved. These edits resulted in a tanscript that varies in a number of places from the recorded interview. The changes do not change the context of the interview, but serve to clarify, expand upon and enhance various items discussed in the oral history interview. a number GH: Garry Hesser HH: Heidi Heller HH: The following interview was conducted with Garry Hesser on behalf of the Augsburg College Archives for the Augsburg College Oral History Project. It took place on March 4, 2015 at Augsburg College. The interviewer is Heidi Heller. Alright, so my first question is how did you get interested in sociology. GH: I was a history major as an undergraduate. I used to ridicule my Sociology major roommate because history dealt with specifrcity, and sociology, only offered sweeping generalizations that everybody knew. I think probably that the sociological perspective came later, as I attended Union Theological Seminary in New York where two of my favorite professors in social ethics and education used sociology and sociological theory as a framework for what they did which was my introduction into sociology. To make a long story short, I wanted to do a graduate degree in Human Relations at New York University. New York University accepted me, but didn,t want to offer me any money and we had a baby on the way. But Notre Dame, in a fit of generosity, thanks to the federal govemment and National Defense Education Act, had received some major scholarship money for graduate students in the sciences. So, in a sense, Notre Dame '.bought me off'to become a sociologist. The degree I was going to do at NYU was a joint Sociology and Psychology degree. But Notre Dame offered the scholarship, and we lived in South Bend already. So, to make a long story short, I was always interested in sociology because of those seminary professors, and I had also become increasingly involved in civil rights, fair housing and issues related to social inequality. sociology is focused on that kind of interest, but it never occurred to me that, without a sociology undergraduate degree, that any school would accept me for graduate work, but Notre Dame did because ofa unique set of circumstances. They were seeking a cohort ofus that didn't have sociology undergraduate degrees. They were trying to compete with Chicago and Berkley by attracting older and more experienced professionals. So I became a sociologist almost in the back door. I was bought and glad ever since. [laughter] HH: Ok. So you had your Masters of Divinity before you got your Masters? GH: Right, I had an undergraduate degree from Phillips University, a school like Augsburg, in oklahom4 with majors in History, Religion, and Philosophy. I went to seminary and was serving Page2ofl5 (Disciples of Christ) congregation in South Bend, India''a. That is how Notre Dame, which was there, came into my life. a Christian Church HH: Ok, alright. So how did you discover an interest in experiential leaming and service based leaming? GG: Um, probably since I was bom. I was bom into a family of educators. My father was a Boy Scout leader and volunteer; and so Boy Scouts became, along with the church, central to my life. And you don't do Boys Scouts, whether it's Indian dancing, like I did, or become an Eagle Scout, camping and hiking, without becoming experiential; it's almost at the core. But, to be more specific, you don't go into something applied like the church ministry without being very experientially oriented. I was up to my eyeballs in civil rights and issues like that with local priests and activists, so my own leaming curve and my own learning process was always very experiential. And when I went to graduate school and had to teach a class as part of my training, my colleague and I, who also stayed in serviceJeaming/experiential education for many years, desiped it with an interactive game, SIMSOC, in the class. We were labeled "Sesame Street" sociologists. fiaughted And then, in summers I worked with OEO projects, as part of the War on Poverty to support my family, doing community-based service related projects. But probably more specifically, when I started teaching at the College of Wooster, my job included being the director of Urban Studies. We had six sites around the country in Detroit, Philadelphia, Portland where students would do an urban semester. The students went there and were involved in service and govemment related intemships. Now we would probably call most of what they did "community serviceJeaming," because it was basically community-based, experiential leaming in challenging urban settings. Then they retumed to a small town, Wooster, Ohio, much like Northfield, with a reverse "culture shock." Two of them, Don and Margie, literally walked into my office and confronted me with: "You sent us offto the big world. Now we're back in this place and have changed. What are you going to do with us?" They basically challenged me and my wife and our two children, four and two, to live with them in a student-faculty livingJeaming arrangement. And we did, thanks to the students pushing us. We organized a communitycentered livingJeaming anangement involving two houses. It was called the "community service house." We designed a course on the topic of "community" together, and we lived with students for the entire year. We would have continued, but we wound of getting pregnant again and had twins. And four children was little bit too much for continuing. So, in a nut shell that experience, that kind of conversation and collaboration with students was a lot like what was happening here at Augsburg in the late 1960s and early 70s with Joel Torstenson and the emergence of HECUA. I was also on the faculty advisory committee in the urban semester program in Philadelphia which brought me into contact with other faculty involved in this emerging experiential education focus on community engagement and service. Overall, it was second nature for me, but it was also because of circumstances and students pushing and saying'Now what are you going to do with us", because at that point, except for these urban locations, Wooster didn't have an intemship program. So we were making it up as we went along within the context of the Wooster's commitment to these six urban sites where they were sent to study for a semester. HH: Were there a lot of colleges at that time doing that or where there a few kind of at the forefront? Page 3 of 15 GH: Not many, but it was starting to emerge when I became involved in the early days. But this was a second generation establishment of serviceJeaming in higher education. I later discovered it was really during the 60's that colleges, including Augsburg's role in founding HECUA - the Higher Education Consortium for Urban Affairs. Joel Torstenson was among that first wave of people during the 60's when much of this started. If you think about this in context, there was the opposition to the war in Vietnam, and the Civil Rights movement was still evolving. For example, the sit-ins were in 1960. There was a lot ofdiscontent on campuses that was starting to take shape in different ways, and different campuses embraced that. The 4-l-4 Academic calendar was one invention, so colleges could be free for a January term of exploratory, usually experiential, courses. That was the original idea, but it evolved in not very create ways later. Even then, we would say in those days "Experiential leaming education was still marginal." And in that 1970's context, it is accurate to say that I am at Augsburg because of differing opinions about experiential education in higher education. I didn't get tenure at Wooster. Paradoxically, the college where I was involved in the community service, student-faculty leaming community and community-based research with students, which made me recognized as a pioneer in serviceJeaming, made a decision based on traditional criteria for what they wanted. Even though I was doing a lot of faculty research and publishing, they made a decision that the kind of scholarship I had embraced did not fit with their priorities for tenure. As a result, I lost and somebody else won the tenure prize. Bu! not to be bitter, I am gratefirl for that for that loss. [laughter] But that was an indicator that experiential education and serviceJeaming were not mainline, even in liberal arts colleges; it was still marginal. The urban quarter programs at Wooster were valued, but seen as something extra, though commendable, if you had time. Does tlat make sense? HH: That makes sense. So, when you came in 1977 to Augsburg was it because you didn't get tenure? GH: That's correct, yes. HH: Was there any other things that drew you here to Augsburg? GH: The job description certainly. A good friend looked at it with me and said "They wrote this job description for you." I was looking for ajob because ofthe tenue decisioq so I felt lucky to see this one that fit so well. On a personal level, I'd also just gone through a divorce, so we also needed to make a change and find an urban location where my former wife could find employmint. we were co-parenting as well. smdl towns usually are not too easy to do all that in. And so, there were whole lot of things about the Augsburg position that were attractive. And the more I found out about it and discovered what Joel rorstenson had been doing, including the HECUA consortium, I was eager to come here and work in academic arrangements that were so similar to my wooster work with the urban semester programs, but with more experiential education. Augsburg was looking for a sociologist to be chair ofthe urban studies program and that is the role I played at Wooster. So, yes, it was kind of a match made in heaven for me and many people think it was mutual. It couldn't have been better and more timely. And another side story. It was a real accident of history, because Joel rorstenson was forced to retire at 65. I gotthisjob because of another form of discrimination. You had to retire at the age of 65 in those days, or he Page 4 of 15 would have, I am sure, stayed on and done even more creative work like I was able to do after 65. But because he had to retire, and the college saw the role he played as cenfral to its mission, Augsburg did a national search and hired me a year earlier than his retirement so I could work with him for a year. And due to another strange accident, made possible by Bob Grams taking an unpaid leave, it became possible financially, which usually wasn't the case for Augsburg. so I was able to come a year early, at precisely the time I needed a job HH: So everything lined up. GH: The stars were aligned in stange a1d unFredictable ways. I walked into a position marked by two realities: the faculty had decided, which the wooster faculty had not, that experiential educatioq including intemships, were important for urban studies majors, but also for all students at the college. I like to say that "Joel and the faculty set the table, and I have been feasting at that table ever since." HH: So it was, at Augsburg, it was a campus wide sort of thing; it wasn't just in the sociology departnent? GH: oh, absolutely. In fact, tlat was what was brilliant about it. Joel, the sociology professor, started the sociology Deparfinen! Social work, urban Studies, and HECUA. In 19t7, he got a sabbatical leave and traveled around the country. He and Frances visited penn, chicago, Rutgers, and a whole lot ofurban based colleges. He came back and wrote his classic paper linking liberal arts objectives to community-based experiential learning, identifying what wi now embrace in the Engaging J\rfinneapolis and Augsburg Experience elements of our curriculum. It wasn,t just a paper;_it was literally read by the faculty and voted on. And a whole new curiculum emerged from that paper, "The Liberal Arts college in the Modern Metropolis." He wrote it bas€d on his research, experience, and his observations of campuses that were engaged in their community as a leaming site. under Joel's leadership, the college grasped the validity of experiential, community-based leaming and emerged as a pioneer in the field, establishing an intellectual and operational base for all that we have accomplished since 1967. It took the university of Minnesota another l5 years to even grant credit for intemships. The Augsburg faculty, with Joel's leadership, the entire faculty, including chemistry, English, religroa I mean everybody. I wasn't here to watch the vote, but it liGrafly was-voteJ on as a principle and then operationalized in a curriculum that could include four intemships, that's four ofyour 36 courses. It also included a required urban related course that demonstraied what that discipline could contribute to the understanding of cities and the human habitat, as well as how the resources of the Twin cities could contribute to the content of any particular course or academic discipline. They called it the "Urban concerns" course. so when I arrived in 1977, that decision had been made and the curriculum was in place. I inherited a campus wide commitrnent to what Wooster and most of Higher Education still considered "marginal." I don't lvant to overstate it, but Augsburg was truly a pioneer in community-based experiential education. Yes, chemistry had a different view of it, Religion had a different view of it, but every department was encouraged to offer courses that had an urban focus, thus embracing our urban locafion as a valuable asset to student leaming. we, and higher education" were not-using Page 5 of l5 the language of serviceJeaming at that point. But, it was experiential education, and it was based on intemships, community-bases service and urban studies programs. HH: Hmm, so what was going on when did arrive Augsburg? n 1977, what kind of things were going on at GH: Well, HECUA was one, in addition to the campus based intemship program. In the early stages, Joel got a grant and Augsburg created an Intemship oflice called MUSIP - the Metropolitan Urban Studies Intemship Program. It was similar to what we offer now in the college-wide Stommen Center, the Career Planning center that supports intemships in all academic majors. And it addressed what Mary Laurel True and others in the Sabo Center do in temn of community service leaming. MUSIP had a staffto support lntemships and active engagement in the community and HECUA programs. I write about MUSIP more in the chapter. But another activity that was going on that was really, really important was what was called CHR [Conserving Human Resources]. It had its own parallel story. I don't know its whole story, but it orbited around vern Bloom, whom Joel had recruited to teach Social work. At trrat point all the social work courses were still in sociology; then we split just as I anived, so they could get accreditation. vem Bloom was a social worker recruited from the Model cities progam. ln the early 70's Cal Appleby, an adjunct professor, began taking his students to Trevilla in Robbinsdale to meet and study with the severely disabled adults who lived there. At the same time the college began to provide co-leaming classes in prisons [stillwater and Shakopee] and with the elderly. One outgrowth of that was students in wheel chairs coming to campus thanks to the efforts of wayne ("Mo') Moldenhauer, an ex-con who had taken Augsburg courses at tre stillwater prison. wayne had talked his way into a job at Augsburg after he completed his prison term. Augsburg Work Study students drove the accessible vans purchased with money Mo raised, and this became the forerunner of Metro Mobility region wide. In addition, this led to a retired alum, Abner Batalden, raising money from Lutheran Churches to make the campus accessible for people in wheel chairs, well before the legislation was passed requiring accessibility. So cHR, which was called conserving Human Resources, added significantly to both Augsburg's traditional students and expanded education for persons who often did noi have access to college. All these efforts were very experiential and firther expanded our communitybased, experiential education and the diversity ofthe student body. It grew into the GLASS office. We also established residential programs in Senior Housing in collaboration with the Housing Authority on the North side. Joe Bash, who invited Joel to bring Augsburg students to !!g North Side after Dr. King's assassination, resulting in the Crisis Colony, which grew into HECUA, invited me to recruit students to live with senior citizens in public housing on Olson Memorial Highway shortly after I succeeded Joel in 1978. All of thes€ efforts buili easily on the foundation, "at the table," that Joel Torstenson and the Augsburg faculty established in the late 60s and early 70s. To recap, when cHR began it was a group ofcollege students from Augsburg that got in a van and drove to the prison with the teacher. Half the class were Augsburg sudents; half were Shakopee women students, Stillwater prisoners or Trevilla residents. I taughi at the Stillwater prison shortly after I came in 1978. By that time students weren't always going to the prison, but faculty were going there, so it didn't involve as many students as in iti origins. nut cHR also reflected the powerful experiential commitment of the college and faculty, along with the coJeaming model associated with community based service-Ieaming in which Augsburg students leamed while serving and studying with others in the communiiy. that, to me, is almost Page 6 of l5 always the best kind of service. It's where you are co-leaming, when you are also being served by those you serve, [conects himself], the men and women in the prison were helping studenr understand things that they were trying to leam. we were also serving them by hetping to provide an education for them. So that was one of the most exciting things and daailed more in in a file recently. I will give it to you to rake a look at. It islirerally a letter from y_h1 Ut Mo [wayne] Moldenhauer, who then wound up being that employee at Augsburg after he got out ofprison, the one who wrote a letter to the student body thankingthem for ttre opporttrnitiei to study with them. Then Mo, after he got out of prison tumed to vern Bloom and iaid ..I need a job, because nobody will hire me." Vem says ..We don't have any money,' and Wayne replied that "I was in prison because I was a con-artist and I took people;s money, so let me ty to raise th9 money for my own job." And Mo did, and essentially when you drive around this city, without going offtoo far on a tangent, you see Metro Mobility vans. well, that began at Augsburg college. Mo raised money to buy vans and Augsburg students with work-study picked up people at Trevilla in wheelchairs because they retrofitted the vans to haul people because -lvlo nothing like that was being offered. And so, Augsburg students, with the money raised, picked up people brought them to campus and we then had all these people coming to Augsburg in wheelchairs. And, as I said earlier, another alum named ebner Bataldin, who hid created an employment program during the Depression while a student himself, had retired from church world service/Lutheran world Relief. As a volunteer, Abner raised money to make the campus accessible, putting in the elevators and walk way. It's a complex causality world, but that was going on when I arrived. So in addition to Joel Torstenson and the Urban Studies program, tlere was a lot activity going on in a variety of different places that took Augsburg studentJ out into the community to leam and grow. And, of great importance, this was considired central to the Augsburg education and mission, unlike most other places in higher education up tmtil that point. *9 HH: Hmm, I did not know any of this. GH: And I found an old file Joel had given me that I had never looked at very closely, which was this letter from Mo when he was still in prison and it has an article the students had written in the school newspaper about the CHR program and taking courses at the prison with prisoners. HH: So the impact is long and deep here. Yes; I have always said that Augsburg reflects the philosophy of ..let a thousand flower blossom." You are pretty much free to do whatever you wantedtohere. There was not always much monetary support, but ifyou had the your energy and enthusiasm, there was and is a lot of freedom to create programs and find support to makJthem work, just as we have done with serviceJeaming and many ofthe experiential education endeavori over the years. In hindsight, as I reflect back to 1977, it would appear that Augsburg was looking for someone to replace Joel Torstenson who also understood the centrality of experiential education to the teachinj and leaming enterprise. This was welltefore the rest ofhigher education did, as we curreritly see in AAC&U's LEAP Initiative and what ttrey call High Impact pe<ragogies, or see in campus compact's. service-I,earning and civic Engagement. ai I have aieaay noted Joel tea ttre zuutty and administration of Augsburg to embrace experiential education thirty ye*s befo.e ttrey have become mainstream. It was also clear to me wfien I was being interviewei to succeed Joj1 that Augsburg was seeking someone who would affirm that pioneering spirit and build upon the 9H: Page 7 of l5 "shoulders of the giants" who early on established the college as a leader in bringing experiential education into the center ofthe curriculum and effective teaching and leaming. Ironically, and fortunately for me, the very qualities that Augsburg was seeking were the qualities that Wooster had decided were not central to their own mission and future. Over the years, it has been clear to me that the national awards and recognition that I have been honored to receive - the campus Compact & AAIIE's Ehrlich Faculty Award for Service-Leaming (1996); Sociologists of Minnesota's Distinguished Faculty Award (1998); MN professor of the year (2002); NSEE's Lifaime Achievement Award in 2014 - were also a stong recognition of Augsburg's firm foundation and enduring support for all that we were able to do together as my colliagues and I have expanded upon what we were given and feasted upon at tlnt "table" all these years. We got paid to teach at the prison and we had faculty release time in order to supervise the intemships which supported the efforts. And there was great support from faculty and administration for the program. Again to make the important and simple point, compared to any other campus, and I have done faculty workshops by now at more than 60 different campuses around the country--compared to any campus I have ever been to- there has always been wide spread faculty and administration endorsement of experiential education at Augsburg, unlike most places. This was not "top down", forced upon us by a president, as marked the beginning of Campus Compact when college and university presidents initiated community service programs, at Stanford, Notre Dame, Brown, or Michigan. It bubbled up from the facility and the students. HH: Has there ever been push back that you have experienced from the faculty? GH: well, the push back would be mostly financial in light of other priorities and limited resources.-The push back, if you would, came when we had to cut out funding faculty to supervise intemships, especially when you would have a departrnent that didnt many students doing intemships. And when finances got touglr, which they did in 1982, when we aimost declared financial exigency, the support to supervise intemship was taken away. Faculty had to teach more classes and we didn't receive additional credit for iupervising intemships and ttrat kind ofa thing. But I don't think tlnt there was ever, by faculty, any serious push back or by the President or leadership or that faculty ever said this was a mistake. It's been a pretty natural evolution and, my role in this, I hope it's been to just keep greasing the sled and moving us frrther and deeper. In light ofthis, I suppose what made it possible to take it to the next level, and I reflected on that in the chapter of the book on Successful service Leaming programs, "on the shoulder of Giants", is something that happened in 1980, to put it in historical terms. I had been on the search committee for a new Dean, Richard Green, an African American chemist from capital University in columbus, ohio. when Richard had barely gotten on the scene, our Associate Dean, Patricia Parker, had to have emergency surgery. Dick tumed to me and Earl Alton, from the chemistry deparhnent, to be the acting Associate Deans while she was recuperatirg. b*irrg the period of time that I was the Associate Dean in 1981, I was given responsibility foi intemships, because that was part ofPat's load. I decided to taki advantage ofthai and do some of the things she and I had talked about. ln the process, I discovered cooferative Education, which was a federally funded program that Gustaws and concordia collige in Moorhead had been taking advantage of. Federal funds were available to restore the origi-nal "MUsIp. Page 8 of 15 Intemship support office that we had to discontinue because of funding in the 1970s. so I, along with Bob clyde, kept rewriting the proposal. we were successfr.rl in gating the federal co-op Ed Grant grant. when the 5 year grant was approved in 1983, the Dean iumed to me and said l'Ygulll do it won't you?" we had always put my name and resume on the application, but I initially said'ho" to the Dean. I didn't think I wanted to spend the next stagi of my career getting intemships mostly for business majors. And I had a sabbatical leave coming up to write a book with a former Wooster colleague based on our interviews of 500 Minneapolis-residents. But I went home that weekend, and my wife said "who are kidding, Garry? Augsburg is never going to lave money to do this sort of thing again. you're going to look over thi shoilder of somebody who takes thejob and moan and groan and whine beiause they're not doing it right. why are you tuming this down?" So I called the Dean on Monday moming and saia *ls it stitt open, I want to do it." so, that gave me not only money to hire and superviie the staff overseeing and promoting intemships, but also time to secure additional funding io hire Mary Laurel [Truef and really expand and deepen the service-learning aspect of experiential education. lronicaty, at a time of very limited financial resources, after almoit declaring financial exigency, I had money t9 havel and attend Cooperative Education and NSIEE meetings. There was rio travel money at the college, but there was federal money in the coop grant so icould havel to support the program. As a result, I became involved in the National Society for Intemships and Experiential Education INSIEE] in Pittsburgh in the fall of 1984. As a tenured faculty member, I walked into a national organization that had been instrumental in promoting experiential education and intemships in higher education and was a leader in the emergirig service-learning movement. And, to give you an idea about faculty involvement at that time in experiential ef,ucation, I went to NSIEE's faculty interest group. There were seven people who showed up, four of them weren't faculty members; they had come to talk to faculty members because-no faculty members back on their campuses wouldtalk with them. The point is, I was one of the few faculiy members and virtually the only tenured faculty member from an institution that actively supported experiential education. And within two years, I became not only its vice-presideni but its President. This was not because I had a whole lot ofskills or knowledge at that point, but because they knew that NSIEE needed someone with faculty status from an institution that supported experiential education in leadership in their organization ifthey were going to be taken s19y9[11the rest of higher education. So the funding let me travel anddeeperimy-affiliation 3+_IIIE_E-_14 the cooperative Education network. In addition, I got tained as part of NSIEE's FIPSE Grant [Fund for the Improvement of postsecondary Education] *d b""u." u *q"t"l consultant in experiential education. So there is a lot accident and the intentionality tied up in what happened, but I always come back to say "IfI hadn't been from Augsburg, an institution that_s_upp9fieq experiential education deiply, going way back to my-predJessor and before, probably little of this would have happened.;, Dois that make sense? i HH: It does make sense. So where do you think Augsburg foundation in that came from? GH: Well, I think I tried to explain-that in the chapter in the book on successfirl service-leaming programs.Augsburg began as an educational institution to train preachers and teachers. So in its DNA and bones [emphasizes this word], Augsburg understood Iiewey ana practiJ exfirience well before it evolved into a liberal arts college and a co-education one and-became finally accredited in the 50s. And I think you could say that this distinguished us from Gustavtrs or St. olaf, which began as fledging liberal arts colleges, even ifwe didn't call them that then. This Page 9 of l5 was a "prcacher school" and seminary until the 50s, and that would be one explanation. The other-is that, by accident, Augsburg relocated from a small town in wisconsin to a rapidly The founders got kicked out of their building in Marshall, and you t noi, tt ut purt ryyrng.citr. of that history. ole Paulson, an urban pastor, up here, responded to so*" f"tho, ioea trrat *we need a college over here in Minneapolis besides the university; they"ity looked over in st. Paul, where they had four, Hamline, Mac, st. Thomas and St. catherine,s. what are we going to do?" My point is that our urban location was also an accident and quite foreign to this bunch of Norwegian farmers who supported tlis new school. virtually none orth"- rivea a ttracity, tut there_was this Norwegian church in Minneapolis that got them to come here. So I think it's, as Joel rorstenson would say "It's our location, location, location.', If you're in Northfield or St. Peter or Moorhead, it's not that you are disengaged with your community, but the community is just not really in your face all the time. And the reaity of ttrat city location in the midst of CedarRiverside's immigrant realties has made a huge diffeience as the'new initiatire ty rirsten [Delegard], is documenting. HH: Historyapolis GH: Yes, and this college arose in the middle of snooze Boulevard and the west Bank, which wls home to immigrants and we were an immigrant college itself. And that is different'tlr* -o.t all the other Protestant liberal arts that were mostly established in small tor-r, pu.tiafy ^colleges because Protestants were scared ofcities. Catholics tended to live in cities and established their colleges there to oversimpli$r a bit. Two faculty members had the mort to Ao JU, e"gJ*g claiming its urban location, Joel rorstenson aod c*l chrislock, who was a histo.y p-ioror. Both carl and Joel went here as students, I think. I know Joel did. But they, rrayr., stenshoel in Political Science, a1d n9b clyde, inspired generations of student "rorjriitr, to-affrm the crty, is political in$sges, history and reality. But again, theri ul*uys seemed to be a comfort with application and relevance to the dynamic and challenging world tlat sunounded us so that the applied experiential education emphasis wasn't foreiga wasn,t a uaa thing. Hence, the link between the liberal arts and professional studies has irarked our history 6r" til*g;;;g. lrH: o. k, backing up to your time when you were serving on the Nationar Society for Experiential Education President. what do you think yoir experience on that? ylu talk about what you were able to give to them. what do you think bang on that brought back for Augsburg? GH: well, the conference I went to in pittsburgh featured the FIpsE Grant from the Fund for Improvement of Post-secondary Education, which NSIEE received to promot. *a r*"rty and.staff in the development of experiential education. ril/ith the .".o*"". "qG of tt C"-lp-'g*, I could cover my expenses related to my training as a consurtant. I was " back-to able to bring j{ugsb_ure, two things, I think. one was an ability to say were on the right toack, tfrat what we had been doing for decades, higher education is nowaff*ming. And the selona trring *as aat r learned how the emerging community_serviceJeaming fiid was unfokring ana ;kin! shape. es a rgylt we w9r9 a!19 to vev qrlckly frnd and get funding from a Mi*"r&. bgi.lrtii" grant that to nire Mary Laurel rrue. That put us in touci- with eveo rnor" r.roil"", ys 9na!t9{ *a?-aiog. And I think the reason I was asked to. write that chapcr in the book was that our service-Laming program was grounded in what Augsburg had been doing for decades. It also gave us a chance Page l0 of 15 to tell Augsburg's story on a national level, which I also have been able to do in the sixty prus g1:Effdevelopment workshops I have done across the u;ini"I). on or the few FIPSE consultants who had faculty stat s. But I was aso exposea to frressiona colleagues.who had pioneered in,the deveiopment of serviceJeamiri *a education overall and add their wisdom and experience to Augsburg and rrectla;s "*frri."tia p.*ti." *J experiential educatioq further enriching and expanding efforts here. My other colleagues, Lois olson, Mary Laurel irue, ira Ira.oi" Benasutti, added further p.resence at NSEE and Campus Compact,_while expanding student invok;"rt development. And I think it's fair.to thTe a{e ro,n" kiy we keep receiving nationar :ay recognition from the President and others. Certainly it is because ofnumbei of studenft we have involved, the_Bonner program and a wide embrace by faculty. But, modesty *i0", it i. also, in part because I have had the opportunity to bi involved nati"rarv. trr" campus compact Erlich Award ror rliaerstrip in Service Leaming recognized me, but also my colleagues_and the college that had supported us in creating high q;lfty I*p"ri"rtia-"Ju""tion programs. Indeed, Augsburg almost stood alone in those early-auy, ufor" oa.. i*"rty ro*a support from their institutions to engage in serviceJeaming. i t"n"rrtt"a i**"nr"iv trr"t support and unique history. c;hy. l*W iil. ,iri* ir "r ;Jil;;rr_ .*o* i*."-" i.i.Ji*ri.r, til- As regards my career, {rs I indicated previously, I had to make a decision. I,m going in two days to Detroit to visit my friend that I was doing research with beginningi, wr"r[, Jtf,aG neightorhoods and housing. During the swnmer of 19g0, we got several grants and we hired four Augsburg students to do summer rese-arch on housing ani neilhborhooar] random sample of 400 households in Minneapolis. We hua g;h"."d " neighborhood dynamics and housing maintenance. Then Aulsburg "ll re."i*a trr. c".p funding in 1983 when I was schedulid for a sabbatical to wriL oui book. rrre aeclsioi to tat<e the co-op job meant I had to tum to George Galster and say..the boot i, yo*r. iJgoing to have the time or be able to take the sabbaticar that r was eligible f"r.,' trr"t research career to do what I have done at Augsburg. But I can say in ..t o.p".t, it i. "p *or" consistent with who I am and my sense of vocation', to use the Augsburg.'-t l. i"r:"v"a trr" research and the topic of housing and neighborhood dynamics whi-cr, ut tlr" Ji,,,v teaching and the Metro urban studies pro-gram. And f bved ".nti', lrgsb*g the students out in the community interviewing and doing research. "pp"rt""ity "irr"rtig i"rp"?*. e"a it was a bit painfril to let go oiit, ro. *y no-d;gltl". nut trr" opportunity took me and "e-o,if directiJns. Augsburg in some very exciting and rewarding and *causi'aaiis #tui eug.u*g needed and wanted me to undertake, the synergy has been, I think, mutuaty teneiJJ.T certainly have benefited immensely and hive no regrets foi pursuing tt *J putr, trri. opened for me. I think that both the college and I ha-ve enhanced " becaus" oitt *uy eacJr other things developed. " rrr"virl*i.*.a tlri"a;;;;*r. ia ir* s;,idi;*" *L ririt**,lJry "o** HH: And have an impact. GH: Yes and a reputation. HH: Yes, yes Page ll of 15 d, GH: Yes, my experiential education workshops have been well received and beneficial because they are grounded and significantly augmented by the overall Augsburg successes and practices of my colleagues, as well as my own community-based teaching and supervision of internships. IIH: So during the 80s, you talk about "On the Shoulders of Giants" from 1984-1989, you were you talking about spent most of your time on experiential leaming that was when you were working as the President and Vice-President, ah, on the board ofNISEE. What kind of changes happened here on campus? GH: During that time period when we had the co-operative education gant, I continued to work fr.rll time as Director of Co-operative Education and wasn't teaching much Sociology or Urban Studies. Then as the funding for the federal grant wound down and we found funding for Mary [,aurel True to expand the service learning, we created.t]e Center for Service, Work and Leaming. We brought the oversight of intemships into this Center. Lois Olson became its Director, and Mary Laurel worked with her, along with Susan Giguire, Sandy Tilton and Menie Benasutti. All that has now expanded to form the Strommen and Sabo Centers as the TorsGnson vision and legacy continues to grow. But during the period you're asking about, I think that one ofthe biggest things that happen was that we evolved as current curriculum was designed. It had two important "book ends." Every first year student is required to take a course called Engagrng Minneapolis that is embedded in one of their liberal arts courses. This is supposed to introduce them to what the urban location would means for their education and introduces them to the leaming opportunities available in the city. The other "bookend" is basically an experiential education graduation requirement called the Augsburg Experience. We more broadly defined what the Augsburg Experience would be, but there were only about 2 or 3 colleges in the country that had an experiential education requirement for graduation, Monmouth and DePaul. An internship is one option, as are study abroad, student-faculty research, an upper level serviceleaming course, and a student can design his or her own experiential project. ln that new curricular context, I retumed to the Sociology department full-time and Urban Studies. And this, I think, is very important to stress. Many of the colleges, like Gustaws and Concordi4 that got the Co-operative education grants, when the money ran out, the programs dried up. Augsburg, and I really credit the faculty and administration, found the resources and have continued to support these endeavors that significantly enhance the quality and reputation ofthe college. As I said, I retumed to teaching full time, and we institutionaliz€d that with the Center for Service, Work and Leaming. And the college continued to support the staffthat had been hired using federal money to start with, affrrming that "Yes, this truly is who we are and we can't let this go when the federal grant ends." The Sabo and Strommen Centers, along with the Center for Global Educatiorl are Augsburg centerpieces because the college faculty and administration have said "we can't be Augsburg College without providing the support systems for students and the faculty related to experiential education." Have we arrived or gone as far as we should and could have? Probably not, but the commitnent is shong, and it has always been a work in progress. HH: You would have liked to have seen more pushed? GII: Well, yes, I think the lack of funding is just pure and simple, but given that, the fact that is institutionalized and the support is there is a testament to the college and its leadership. Page 12 of 15 it HH: And it still remains today, so. GH: Yes, and maybe it is even stronger. When we split the Center for Service, Work and Leaming to forrn the Strommen Center to oversee the internships and career service and the Sabo Center to intensiff our work in public service and public involvement, it reflected President Pribbeno's vision and call when he came here as President. Paul says that he was athacted to Augsburg College, as were the other candidates, when I recall their speeches, because of its embracing of its urban location. His competitor was a person who was Provost at the University of Colorado in Denver. Paul wanted very much to be at a school that was committed to community service and its surrounding community. And he was attracted to Augsburg because, of all the Lutheran colleges, we were the one most engaged. So you could say, and he does say, that he came here because he knew the college was already committed to leaming. HH: And that is current President Paul Pribbeno? GH: Yes HH: Ok. Alright so what do you believe your greatest challenge in work here at Augsburg has been? GH: On a personal level, the greatest challenge is to stay focused. There are so many opportunities. And my own personal inclination is to tackle too much. I would sometimes describe myself as an intentional dilettante. I get excited about new ideas and my wife says I have trouble walking in a straight line fiaughter]. so, on a personel level the greatest chalienge was to stay focused and see things through before I launch into another idea and take on something else. And that, I think, is the institutional challenge for Augsburg as well. We probably should have been more disciplined and strategic, but who knows? HH: What do you believe has been your greatest challenges in your work at Augsburg? GH: I think that when we embraced the new curriculum, we had to give up original Urban Sfudies required course. There used to be a required course in urban studies that went clear back to that curriculum in the 60s and 70s. But when we identified the Engaging Minneapolis and the Augsburq Experience as requirements, I chose to go with that decision. But I think my biggest sense of failure or biggest challenge tlnt we've faced was that the Engaging Minneapolis course very quickly, for practical reasons, became first just a serviceJeaming course that often didn't really accomplish the larger objectives. It specified very clearly that the inhoductory courses would introduce students to leaming opportunities in the city, notjust service, as valuable as that is. so if you were a history major, the intro course would intoduce you to the resources and accessibility to the Minnesota History center, the Hennepin county Historical. If you were chemistry or business major it would introduce you to research and work going at 3M, Ecolab, Target or Medhonic. It wasn't that you would always be doing service. So, first Engaging Minneapolis tended to become identified with just service, which was not the primary inG"t. That tended to introduce students primarily to the problems of the city even more than seeing the city and region as a resourc€. It did not meet the goal that Joel rorstenson and I believed in, Page 13 of 15 namely equipping students to understand cities, how they work and how people, as citizens, need to be actively engaged, not just servicing people, but politically and socially making the community a better place by working together with the people who live in it. And so even to this day, the Engaging Minneapolis course doesn't usually meet lyhat the criteria are, which was to introduce new students to the leaming opportunities of the city and how the discipline of the course being taken contributes to an understanding of the city-whether English, Literature, History, Chemistry, etc. That is a weakness, I think. When I became the Sabo professor of Citizenship, and when I retired last year, I became less and less engaged with the actual gurriculum. My own personal sense of failure and the institutional challenge is what do we really do with the Engaging Minneapolis requirement related to what it was designed to do. The graduation requirement ofthe Augsburg Experience is, I think, still pretty solid, but, like everything, can always use more attention and support. And we are starting to do more support for intemships. we now have a major frrnd and grant to give support to students doing unpaid intemships, so more people will do intemships. So, for me, the biggest challenge is to simply make the curriculum "book ends," the Engaging Minneapolis and Augsburg Experience, be what they were designed to be and intended to be. But no one thought that would be easy anyway. HH: Ok, on the flip side, what do you hope to be remembered for? What do you hope your legacy is here at Augsburg? GH: well, I say it a lot, and I know I really mean it. I hope my legacy is that I contributed to and helped the Torstenson platform and legacy continue. I hope I have deepened that in some important ways. And, in a broader sense, hopefully my legacy is that i played a role in increasing the quality and quantity of what is "on the table,', using the metaphor ofJoel Torstenson, carl chrislock, Bob clyde and Myles Stenshoel setting the table for us. I deeply believe they did, because the curricular pieces were mostly in place when they retired, too. Hopefirlly, my legacy is that I put more on the table, that I helped put a lot ofvariety, good "food" on that table to help Augsburg students, faculty, and staff to feast at and to takJ advantage of as they d,ine at Augsburg [aughter]. Sorry, I may milk that metaphor too much. And I hope that in my final role as the sabo Professor of citizenship and Leaming, we have been able to transfer and continue to translate community engagement in some new ways. community engagement should mean, I think, looking at the city as a place to leam along with otlers, but also as a place to co-create as we listen to the voices of community members and co-leam together as a leaming community. That also should help us understand what citizenship is about, namely, citizens engaging each other in problem-solving. citizenship is not about me fixing you. It requires working together to make our communities healthy, generative, and humane for all. And so hopefully that is an emerging role for the college that I have contributed to. Having Harry Boyte, Dennis Donovan, and Elaine Eschenbacher and the Center for Democracy and citizenship move here from the University of Minnesota is giving us a way to keep expanding the Torstenson vision. And that is very consistent with that vision, namely'equipping every Augsburg student to be an active citizen and community builder, exercising their civic agency, as Harry would stress, and work with others to address the issues and challenges facing theiity or community where they live. Joel rorstenson's basic theme was that we need to eqoip every Augsburg student to be a community builder. we don't know where people are going to live, but we know trrat communities are dynamic, organic, and evolving, so through engagemEnt in the city, through service and whatever modes we would call experiential education, itudents from Page 14 of 15 Augsburg are, we hope, better equipped to be community builders. I hope that my legacy is to have conhibuted to that vision and the educational preparation that enables all who leam and work here to be active community builders the rest of their lives. So, hopefrrlly, I have contributed to that vision and that I have helped my colleagues at Augsburg embrace it as well. It certainly has become central to Augsburg's reputation, and I know many ofus have helped that happen. The other legacy of Joel Torstenson that is consistent with my own values isi deep belief in a multi-cultural community that values and honors people of all beliefs, reputations, ethnicities, skin colors and orientations. That is also the college's new demographic profile, which is quite unlike any other Lutheran or most other Protestant related liberalarts colleges. And it represents a foundation that our urban location makes possible, where that diversity has happened and is happening. That is a legacy that I hope I contributed to by what I have done over the years, but it is the result of many, many hands and efforts that I have been privileged to share-u,hat a gift and good fortune. This should equip us to be even better community builders and civic agents. HH: Ok. Well, I want to thank you Garry for your time. GH: You're welcome and thank you. Page 15 of l5
Show less
- Title
- Transcript of Oral History Interview with Mary Kingsley, 2015
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Search Result
-
Interview with Mary Kingsley
Intenieryed at 2426 Sheridan Ave'
Minneapolis, MN
Interviewed on March 18th, 2015
Augsburg College Oral History Project
Inteniewed by Anny Finch
Mary Kingsley- MK
Anny Finch- AF
Time
toe
0.13
Ar:
The following interview was conducted with Mary Kingsley on be...
Show more Interview with Mary Kingsley Intenieryed at 2426 Sheridan Ave' Minneapolis, MN Interviewed on March 18th, 2015 Augsburg College Oral History Project Inteniewed by Anny Finch Mary Kingsley- MK Anny Finch- AF Time toe 0.13 Ar: The following interview was conducted with Mary Kingsley on behalf of the Augsburg College Archives for the Augsburg College Oral History Project. It took place on March 18th 2015 at Mary Kingsley's home. The interviewer is Anny Finch. Mary Kingsley is a fonner professor of Modem languages, taught Spanish for 42 years at Augsburg College. During her time at Augsburg, she was a key member in faculty govemance and encouraged and engaged students about how one should be in the world She also has a passion for justice. Thank you again for your time. My first question is just to tell me about your background and education, kinda a back-story? 1.03 MK: Well, I grew up Crosby-honton, a mining town and my father was a mining engineer and I went to school at Crosby-konton High school and then I followed in the tradition of our family and went to St. Olaf. Where my grandmother had been widowed at a young age and she we'nt to Nortbfield, bought a house and made a living there so that she could educate her children and have them go to St Olaf which they did. So we came into tlnt tradition. So I got my B.A. from St Olaf in 1962 and I was a member of the Span Program that went to Spain in the summer of 196l before I graduated. And because ofthat I feU, I switched my major in college which was French to Spanish which was my minor and went back to Spain on my own and went for a year to the University of Madrid and got (Spanish Spoken here) from the Univenity of Madrid and then because I wasn't planning on getting any degree, I was just was doing it for myself , I decided that I better stay and get a master's degree so Middlebury had its own program by that second year and then I finished that in 1964. And I applied for ajob by mail, I applied to four colleges or universities and I got ajob at the University of South Dakota in Vermillion, South Dakota. And everybody there would ask each other how did you end up here? And I was only 24 years old and I had already ended up somewhere and I was but I did, I did enjoy that year. But, when I was there I called Mimi Kingsley who had beeq who taught Spanish at Augsburg and Mimi Kingsley and Jim Kingsley were my span advisors and she said that they were going to go to Chile to work for the Ford Foundalion on the library in Chile and why didn't I come to Augsburg to teach. So anyway, she recommended me to be hired at Augsburg and...and in March I think, they called me and I thought I was suppose to stay two years at least at someplace. Well anyway, I thought well if I get offered the job well I'll take it so I left and went to Augsburg after one year al the University of South Dakota. And I had never been to Augsburg so I had never seen Augsburg so when I told the dean, Martin Quanbeck that I had never seen Augsburg when he offered me the job and I accepted, he was kind of shocked. So therU I decided I better go, take a look at Augsburg and I gave them a look at me. So went to Augsburg and Mimi I-I Kingsley introduced me to the dean and we talked for an hour and we talked only about religion for the whole hour. And I was never introduced to the chair ofthe depaxtrnent ofmodem language. (laughing) Butn so the reason we talked about religion was in those days it was legal to question and I had been in Spain, "sk the and I had had a lot ofquestions about my beliefs so I had been raised a Luttreran and then I spent two years in a residence ran by a Catholic Order so I was very introduc€d to Catholicism as well but I was kind of slipping out of Christianity at that so I wrote my Augsburg application that I was half Catholic and half other (laughing) so he wanted to know what I meant by that. So that's uihat we discussed for an hour and we had an interesting conversion and he didn't take back his offer (laughing) for the job. So that was, that was my introduction. 5.30 AF: Tell me about when you first started at Augsburg, how the feeling was, how the people were? 5.42 MK: Well...we had faculty workshops in those days and there was a new dean, dean Ken Bailey and I was new and the president Oscar Anderson I think- I'm not sure, he was, I don't think he was new that year but he was quite new and he had hired Ken Bailey from Moorhead from which he had come, originally to, he was a pastor before at a well known church in Concordia, Oscar Anderson was. So anyway, we had this workshop so I knew I was coming into this with relatively new people in the administration and, and so I first went to a language department meeting before the faculty meeting so I heard all the conversation about something they were talking about and I heard what they were going to present to the faculty. And when we got to the faculty meeting, the chair got up and presented something entirely different. (Laughs) once the department head had decided so I started wondering oh what is this? What is going on here? you know here they had decided something and he goes and presents something else well so that was my introduction to the departrnent and to faculty meetings so I was more or less just an interested, igrrorant bystander to those first meetings. But I had when I first started, I had-I think I had, I think we had 8 courses then at that time ifl remember correctly, courses a somester, oh a a year, a year rather, four a semester. And I think I had two beginner classes and two intermediate classes and it stands out in my mind is that, I went and told that grade intermediate class that the they got would be exactly what they deserved and there was a visible gasp (aughing the grade they deserved) so the whole one thing that stands orit, well group came up afterwards and said oh well we had this terrible class last year and we all signed up for the same one so that so that so there wouldn't be, they wouldn't believe how little we knew and everything was so and so they were worried about what would happen and, and I think that it tumed out alriCht, that somehow we made it thrcugh thaf, that second year but they were but I think someone had been fned to hire me. They were planning on doing it but they waited till the last possible minute tlat's why I got the ofer in March to come in so this person had not been to successflrl with the students. So they were worried but, but it everything worked out alright I think, I think we had, has a good year. 8.40 AF: 8.50 MK: Talking about you becoming a deparftnent chair, can you describe the role ofa deparanent chair, why you took it on? Well that was, that was sort of a interesting thing, it was prctty much well known that I didn't enjoy deparhnent meetings. (Laughs) And here I was, I was first asked to be the interim chair because Mimi Johnson who was the chair and taught French was asked to take on some other work. So the dean asked me ifI would be acting chair and I think everyone was surprised when I said yes that I would do it cause I think I was, it was well known that I didn't enjoy deparhnent meetings. For one thing, is I recall there wasnt much of, we didn't really have an agenda to stick to so when I went to be acting chair, I told them that I figured that they probably knew that I, they were probably surprised that I accepted this job and I said that we were having an agenda and we were going to start our meetings at a quarter to four and we were going to finish at five, our meetings just went on as long as the last person was talking and ifanyone was still left (laughs) to talk to. So I was trying to bring order, oh and then I discovered that I eqioyed bring order to chaos (laughs). Which I saw happening and I think that-that the department enjoyed that too. Because we got out so the next year, I was elected chair unanimously I think and I had a lot of support by the second election ofa three year term, I had made some decisions that (laughs) caused some, so I didn't enjoy such a support, by that second election and by the third, I think I had to vote for myselfto make sure (laughs) I would get elected. So I was chair for three terms and then Frankie took over for six years and then after six years she didn't want to do it anymore, I came back in for another nine years- three terrrs. So, but the work of the chair...involves a lot things and there were personal di{ficulties, questions from students but mainly getting the courses, deciding on the curiculum and getting the courses set up and assigmng everybody and all the adjuncts to courses year by year and keeping that going in an orderly fashion. And I think, deans have told me tlat almost everybody handed in programs for the following year with mistakes and I had several things, oh, oh well. No I didn't think I had made any mistakes, well, oh well maybe not, but then I did make one and it was a lulu. (laughs) That was that I assiped Don Steinitz to two classes (laughs) at the same time. And, and we found out about it two hours, he came in, oh no there is a terrible mistake and he hadn't noticed it either, something had shifted, changed something in the summer or it was different from what I had in the fall when I handed it fuL I put him into an open spot, we had filled it with we had moved his other class and neither one ofus noticed that so another Spanistr teacher switched with him and before the class met and before the classes met, sort it out again was a litfle hicky but so that was, ah that was a lulu to have somebody assigned for two classes (aughs) at the same time, for someone who was bragging about not mak- not making mistakes. A-nd so I donl I don't just make little ones, I made a big one so that for me was and keeping everything, you know. Solving questions, somebody for example, had a question ofa student cheating in a class well then it ended up in my lap with that and that, I dealt with that and different, all sorts ofthings. But mostly, mostly people took care oftheir own issues with students and things but once in a while, you'd deal with something like tlat. 13.15 AF: Did the experiences or responsibilities, did they ever change over time, since you first started as a deparfiment chair or to later coming in? Or has it always been consistent? 13.26 MK: By the time I was elected chair, chairs were elected by the department but when I first came to Augsburg they were named by the administration. And I was um, telling Phil Adamo yesterday, that shift where I can remember going in to dean Bailey and I said we need to have a process at Augsburg for getting rid of departnent chairs and he looked at me and said I don't like your language. (laughs) And then I realized getting rid of sounded, (laughing) sounded a little bit fierce. So, but anyway, if you look in the faculty handbook there is a process now for the removal of department chairs. And then it went into voting I don't remember exactly how that came that of the departrnent votes that came later after that. But that would be another process that came before I was chair, where the departnents elected chairs and we had the tlree year terms and another election and so on and so on. So tba! that process changed in that way, there was a process for deparfinents, I think it might have been used once only. Butjust having a process helped so that people, and having people elected to so that would so that they would try not to do things that would be too disruptive. One of my colleagues said to me, one time, oh everybody meaning all of the permits look out for their own piece of the pie. I was famous for always thinking ofthe college first much to the consternation of the deparEnents sometimes because it meant doing what I thought departrnents should do. Which was to cut classes if we didn't have large enough enroltnents and to ty and try to be responsible in managing the money that we had and the resources that we had. Keeping the overall college in mind as well and not holding on to everything we could so I said to the person, not everyone looks out for their own piece of pie, my answer always was there's no piece without a pie. So we have to look out for the pie. (aughs) So as in that sense, I was also looking out for our piece. Because but the college so I always did try to look out for the college as a whole. On the other hand, when Frankie came iq I think Frankje was really good at looking at, thinking about how the department should maybe change over the years and so it is good to have different people if you can have different people with diffetent visions. So I was trying to keep things together, keep it going with the needs of the college but and looking out for the department too and my way. Frankie, I think was better, looking out for some of the shifting trends and, and the departnent did change after I left it. They were working on that my last year. I had Frankie on a committee working with people to change the name of the deparfinent and the name changed even to cultural studies or something, I can't even remember exactly what it became. I'm confidante the departnent has taken care of all of that (laugh$ after I've gone. They ended up going offin a new direction and that's a good thing. 17.00 17.18 AF: I'll shift a little bit to your involvement in the faculty governance cause you kind oftouched on it. Can you kind of discuss your role in the faculty beyond just being a deparhent chair and kind of how many deans or presidents who've served under while you were at Augsburg? MK: Well, first I served under as I said Oscar Anderson and Ken Bailey and then Ken Bailey- left the deanship and he went into the faculty which was a difficult rhing to do and I always admired him greatly being able to make that switch. It would not be easy to be removed as dean and then go into the faculty and he did that and he did it well. He was elected to faculty senate and played a major role as a faculty merrber so I served with him as dean first then as a colleague and I always had a high regard for him and considered him a friend. And that's when Chuck Anderson came in as dean and when he first came in as dean, I had just written a little play (laughs) that was criticizing the administration. And it was criticizing the Oscar Anderson administration cause the faculty at that time had a personal committee that decided promotions and they had gone through the whole process of making recommendations but hadn't announce them yet. And Oscar Anderson announced that we had too many people in the upper ranks and he was suspending promotions for the year. So I wrote a little play criticizing that action. (laughs) I was sick at home with the flu and I sat down and wrote this play. I think it was called the little engine of morality play and it was about how this poor engine was trying to get over to (made up Latin spoken) my made up Latin sounding like things, you know, and I had a good time with it. And with everyone trying to get through and then things changed and shifted and it was quite critical. Well I showed it to Chuck Anderson and a- a- he was riding through the hall pass my office often and he stopped in and intro- he was the new dean and then I gave him a copy of this play and he said I can't wait until you start writing things for me. Well, he probably would have (laughs) shifted on that waiting for me to write things for him. We had a complicated relationship and I did have quite a few complaints about things and did write things and talk with him later so he. He was the dean under Oscar and then he was chosen dean and he, chosen president, in fact I think Oscar retired a year early maybe because St. Olaf was looking for a president and I think, he was concemed that Chuck might go to SL Olaf instead of stalng at Augsburg. So then by that time I was on faculty senate and I could back up and tell a little bit more about that but I was on faculty senate and I was the committee to chose the new president could include one male faculty mernber and a female faculty member and the faculty senate was going to chose these people. And ihe faculty senate chose me and- John Holm in chemistry and I had mixed feelings because as usual I had just been through some big confrontation (laughs) with Chuck Anderson. And so I went and talked to him and I was trying to figure out whether I could be completely unbiased in that role and then I decided, I thought I could be but I thought I shouldnt stay in that role knowing that we had had these differences of opinions and I thought it would be better if somebody else would do it. Just in case anybody would think thBt I would be biased or whatever, I thought I could be unbiased but I removed myself from that and then I think Maureen Mcniff served in that role. So there was good faculty administrative, I, I I think good faculty govemance procedures going on and as I recall, I think this is accurate, the committee to chose the new president decided that it was clear who should be the new president early on and they suspended the search andjust chose Chuck Anderson. And I remember that I saw him out in the parking lot and I think I was one ofthe first people to congratulate him on his win and the search and then he was president for many years. So then after Charles Anderson and then I served under Frame until he left and then I was, and then that was with his dean who was then Chris Kimball, who was a colleague of mine, who came from being an associate professor to being the academic dean which is not an easy thing to do. And then ah one year under Pribbenow before I- retired. And, and that was with then Barbara Anderson who was, he didn't call her an interim dean but she was sort of placed in there for a temporary time and then became the official dean at the request ofPribbenow who named her his only, his only chose. So she was a friend of mine and I wanted her to be the dean but I thought there should be a search. So I was the only friend ofBarbara Farley's who wrote a letter and said Barbara Farlee is a friend of mine, I want her to be dean, we should follow the official process and have a search, an open search because this method is not good for Barbara Farley, it's not good for the president and it's not good for the college. So that was ignored (laughs) which was ok with me because I did what I thought I should do and I thought I was being a good friend to Barbara Farley by pointing that out. So that's tlrc history ofthe presidents and the deans, so when I first got to Augsburg, one of the first committees I was on was the social committee. The social committee was made up of all women and guess what their job was? AF: What? MK: (augls) To decide what should be served at the faculty meeting and one of them, one of the five women on the committee would pour the coffee and a good time was had by all of course. So I sat dovyn and I wrote a letter to Oscar Anderson, one of my first letters to a president and I said that I thought that the social committee should be abolished. Because we as faculty have much more important things to do such as to plan a faculty love-in, a faculty pot party, I bad about five things that were equally as serious, (laughing) you know, and, and in response, I got a very formal letter from Oscar Anderson saying fhat the social committee was a very important committee and would have to continue and needed to continue or something on that order. So we named all men to it and it was abolished immediately (laughs) after that. So in those early years things were quite different from what they became and in the early, I went to Augsburg in 1965, in the early 70s about ten people were fired and most of them were women and some women anonymously who were not fired I thinl, who weren't affected by the cuts filed a lawsuit charging sexism. And it became big news in the paper and it was the president was going to name a committee to study this whether or not there were biased against women at Augsburg. So he named Marjorie Sibley to chair-person of that committee and the faculty senate named the four other members and the four other members were Mles Denchel, Jean Skibby, Norrran Newman and I was the fourth one so the 5th one. So we went to a meeting with Oscar Anderson and other administrators and in that meeting, President Anderson said that we may study the documents of Augsburg to see if they were sexist but we couldn't study any cases. So I looked at him and I said do you mean to say that if Augsburg was unfair to a faculty member or faculty mernber was to Augsburg you don't want to know it? And I get emotional easily so I assume that it's true I had tears in my eyes probably and another administrator said well you people are really uptight, Mary's got tears in her eyes and another member of the committee said no we're not uptight but if we can't look into the cases then I'm resigr.ing from this committee, me too, me too, me too, me too, me too. So immediately he shifted and said we could look into the cases which we did for two years and then we made recommendations and in the credit to Oscar Anderson and his administration they followed our recommendations. So we started with a new salary scale that was pretty objective it didn't take into account subjective criteria and Miles Denchel and I spent a whole Easter vacation, siuing in here studying all of the documentation about every person and we found that in almost every case men were favored over women in the salary and even disciplines that were considered more feminine were discriminated against in salary. So something like English verses Chemistry, English would have a lower salary. So that was an important committee and it made a big difference and I think it gave that Augsburg was ahead of a lot of other private colleges in trying to hire women, promote women and they weren't any women on faculty senate at the beginning either and I don't rernember how tley were nanied or if they were elected. But Miles Denchel is due to the heiress system where you could weigh! you could name, if you named it if any group ofpeople named, I think you needed about ten or twelve votes if you had number one, were rated number one by ten or twelve people, you could get elected. So it weighted the vote sort of like that last election on the mayor in Minneapolis so that helped women get on senate. And at one year after that I remember one year there was only one man on senate that was very unusu"l. (laughs) But so senate became more representative ofthe desires of various groups on tle faculty. So senate was an important part and I was on faculty senate for at least 25 years staight so I was on there a lot-but one person speaking out could have a big afect- also and I did think like my play that I put out all over and other time Charles Anderson announced that he was going to, he- well he didn't annormce, he sent letters to five people. And told them that they weren't guaranteed a contract the next year and the reason was, he had to make some cuts in order to have raises for the rest ofthe faculty. So one of, so somebody who worked under me, Joel Muggy worked under me as I was Director of Intemational Programs so that was another role that I played and he worked under me and he came and told me that he had gotten one of these letters. So then I suspected that somebody else who was a friend of mine in the English depaftnent, I didnt know who had all gotten them but she had gotten home so I went and asked Chuck if she was getting one and he said yes. And I said, you should call her so she will know that's she is getting one ofthese letters otherwise she is going to come in tomorrow moming and find it under her door and that would not be good. (laughs) And he said, you got yourself into this mess, you get yourself out cause I think I had mentioned to her that some ofthese letters had gone out but we didnt know whether she was getting one. Well he wouldnt call her, so I ended up writing a letter to the whole faculty and I asked them to vote to give up their raises for a year to save those five people. And some colleagues whom I respected didn't think we should make that vote and they got up and left when the vote happened cause they didn't want to vote no but they didnt want to be voting yes either and I respect that. And they left, but the faculty voted to give up their raise to save those five people and those five positions were safe in those departments for many years to come. I think they are still, all, they didn't have to be cut. That's the only thing I've ever fought for that I think now was a mistake, that we shouldn't have given up our raises because it put us even farther behind, that we should have argued for something else. But it did save those five people and the faculty in general is, was willing to do that and in our deparfinents sometimes too, we offered to cut back in our departnent so save somebody in our departnent but the administration wouldn't let us do that and tlnt probably was right. Because you have to keep thinking about what's going on and what you can reasonably sustain. People sometimes making these generous sacrifices, maybe it's not the b€st thing, maybe that wasnl 11rc $s51 thing oveiall for our salaries for example. So I have wondered about that but at the time, I was convinced it was the right thing to do. That would be one thing I wonder, look back and wonder was that you know maybe that was a mistake. 33.27 33.41 AF: You were talking about being on the faculty senate, during your time on what was- can you discuss kind of the priorities of the faculty senate and how they were determined? it MK: Well-I think that they probably were determined by the issues that were brought to us by other faculty mernbers or the administration or the board. And one year, that was really important, all thou I don't remernber what year it was but one year-{harles Anderson announced in the fall that he was going to declare financial exigency which is a really big step that allows you to fire tenured people. But it means you are in serious financial trouble, well the faculty senate that year because somebody on the board had requested it was studying the committee structure so that was what we were working on. And a friend of mine kept saying to me, I don't think we really have to declare financial exigency, I don't think that's what we should really be doing, in one ear, out the other. Finally there was something in between one eye and the other to stop that, Ijust started listening and thinking well, well she is right, we really shouldn't do that, so I went to senate and I said, what are we doing talking about committee stnrcture when the president's talking about declaring financial exigency? Why are we talking about committee structure? We should be talking about this, so we started building up and we had other people in the faculty interested in one thing and finally convinced the president that was the wrong thing to do and gave reasons and he listened. And we stopped it and we, the dean was saying well we are going to be better than ever, well without any plan. Well how are we going to be better than ever, we cu! how many tenure people would we cut and how another, we would be then, how is this going to get out and so on, so anyway, we convinced the president and he convinced the board and we had a big committee on where we could cut elsewhere and, and a lot of the things we said we would cut, (augh$ the committee decided to cut football. Well you can see how well that went over, we also decided to cut Norwegian but of course that didn't save a lot ofmoney. It's always hard to cut we have, that is one of our weaknesses at Augsburg is knowing where to cut and really evaluating how are things going; where could we save, what do we really need and, and now in languages be an example with French and Ge(nan have lower enrollments a lot ofplaces and we don't have a strong, we don't have a whole lot of French students or a whole lot of German students so is there or with Frankie Shackelford leaving Norwegian, do we really need to have, Norwegian was saved and it was saved by Ed Stebella of the Business departrrent. Who got up and spoke against it said we should not be cutting Norwegian, we are a Norwegian school and, and that came back in. I don't know how football was saved but I'm sure the president had a role in that and it probably wasn't a good idea. (laughs) That's right that probably wasn't a good idea but the faculty and the administration working together, I mean, we all ended up being together and so-in a lot of these things where I had differences of opinion with Charles Anderson and I was a faculty leader who spoke out often in opposition, he wrote me a letter one time and said lve tried to think about why you and I are so often on opposite sides and he was trying to tmderstand which is something that I look back on and I respect and admire and know it was an important characteristic. And- he said, I think it's because I get as much for the college as I can and you try to get as much for the individual that you can. Because I defended individuals who were in trouble with the college, who were fired or removed as chair or something like that and I tied to help them through the grievance procedure or the faculty acuity committee, the ah-- in one case it was a chair person had been removed and there was a process for that and he could have an advocate. I was his advocate and on the staff, to make a long story short, I was named StaffAdvocate by a staff committee the A.O.W. the Augsburg Office Workers, because I had helped a woman who had been fired. And I didn't get her, her job back but at least the committee said stre had been misteated and I thought it was important to help her. And I helped her, um, because nobody came forward to help her, I didn't even know her but I knew the procedures hadn't been followed. And I thought, they should follow their procedures and her boss was a friend of mine but the only, the only mistake she made was she hadnt given her a fair, critical evaluations, she had given her good evaluations always but then she got mad one day and fired her. (laughs) And that's what you can't do and so she was trying to be nice, I think and so the H.R. person told her, well you got to, I've kind of slipped offtrack wittr this story about the staff member person so the staff person, a[ needed help I thought, so I went and told her boss who was my fiiend that I was going to help her. She said, how did you get into this, and I said well nobody was helping her and I felt that I had to do it and she wasn't very happy. So I did help her and the committee did say that she had been mistreated but they did give her a sum of tuition rernission for her children so at least she got something. Well then later, she went to the human rights commission and filed a suit against the boss. So then I felt, she charged thag tlnt the boss was using ageism as discrimination. Oh it was because her husband was a doctor and I don't know what, you know, diferent things, and I knew she didnt really believe those things and I didn't think they were tue. So she enlisted me as a wihess, she hadn't talked to me but she listed me as a witness. So then I went to my friend and I said well now I've gotten these things, oh do whatever you think you should do, she didn't want to hear anything about it. So I wrote a letter to the Human Rights Commission and then I argued against every criticism ofthat worker and defended the boss and it said that the boss di4 had made a mistake and the reason I helped her was that the boss had not given her a fair evaluation and had not told her that she needed to improve in these areas and had just gotten mad and fired her and of course then she didn't believe it when the H.R. told her, that she should have told the boss to give her a month to get better and so on and she didnt believe she was really going to get a free month and I dont think anybody thought that was possible after that. So anyway, I defended the boss, so then one day I ran into Chuck in the hallway, we had a lot of face to face in the hallway, he said you should know, that so and so was cleared of all those charges by the Human Rights Commission. And I said, oh good, you should know I wrote a letter to the Human Rights Commission (laughs) negating every one ofthose or arguing against every one of the charges that the staff member made. Cause, so, I'm glad, so he was oh so he was, so we are back to where I was. He was wondering why we had these disagreements, so I sai{ he said I try to get as much for the college that I can and you try to get as much for the individual, I said, all I want, I don't want anything for the individual expect fair treatnent, that's all I want. I'd, I'd be happier ifthey didn't get anything expect that fair treafinent. I'm not after your salary which I got for somebody else, I'm not after tuition remission, after, I'm after fair treaffnent and I said, I think that I am also fighting for the college because if we're unjust to one person, it hurts the whole college. Which I really believe----so he was, you knoq probably, another time he wrote me a letter when we were in the midst of a big disagreement. And he said, I want to know in writing if you respect your president. So I thought for a while, ob, so I wrote back, I show my respect for you by telling you what I really think---and I think tlnt teachers, professors, administrators over other people below who, who's salary jobs depend on them often don't get (laughs) in honest response from those in charge oftheir grades or their salary or their promotion or whatever. So I, I really believe that showed a lo! that he was lucky to have somebody who was honest and so, so we had these things back and forth. And I know we don't have a lot of time so I'll just cut to the chase and say that underneath it all, I had a deep affection, underneath all those real disagreements, I had a deep affection for Charles Anderson. And after he retired, well before he retired, he had cancer, did you know that? And I had had cancer. So I met him in the hallway and I said, I bet you didn't think I would be your role model, (grumble) so he didnl I said, I swvived cancer and I want you to survive cancer. So, in that sense, I should be your role model. (laughs) So after he retired, he came up to me at somebody else's, Rick Nelson's retirement party, took one ofmy hands and looks at me and said, I miss our little exchanges. And I did too, bu! wele probably the only two people who missed them. But in the end, and, as I wrote to Kate and I becarne friends when Chuck had Alztreimer's. My husband had Alzheimer's too. I understood a lot of what she was going through and I was really sorry when Charles Anderson came down with Alztreimels. Because I knew what it was and I always thought of his family and I bet there was no body as sorry as I was. Um, but, well, when he died, I sent a memorial to them and I wrote in there that I thought a lot about our relationship and I thought that in the end, we were really deep allies. We were working from different positions, from different points of view, different perspectives but we were both fighting for the college as we sought best to do. And wha! one of the things that I re-regret not having told him, I told Phil yesterday too, I never thought I could do his job, he probably that I did. But I never did. (aughs) I was only fighting for those issues one at a time. You can see, I have strong emotional feelings about him. (tears) He made me madder than anybody except my husband. (aughs) And I think that's because I cared. I cared what he did. I guess I probably wanted him to be perfect all the time. (laughs) And he was, he was a important person in my life. And I was happy to hear that when he had Alztreimer's, a colleague, a former colleague of mine and staffworked where he was and she told me that, she would tell him before she would go out to eat with some of us from Augsburg would get together once a mont[ she would tell him, that she was going to see so and so and so and so and so and so and every time she would mention Mary Kingsley, he would laugh. And I was happy, I was happy. (tears) So I don't know where we've ended up but. - 47.18 AF: Ah, we can talk abou! um, why you decided to retire after 42 years? 47.25 MK: OtU well-well I was 67, for one thing, so I, I thought 67 was probably a good age. I also had had, well I had cancer in 1991 so I was 5l and, and 2005, I had to have a pace maker put in so I had that health issue but that worked fine. I'm on my second one now and I'm doing fine but I also had bad knees and I needed surgery in both knees. But I don't think that any ofthat really that much. I just think that I thought, I should retire when I was at my prime and still going strong. And I slrculd make room for others and so people would ask me, oh are you going to travel a lot? You gonna travel a lot? And I says-said uno, moono, only inward. I'm only interested in traveling inward. And to two people, I said, vrhen they said, what are you going to do? I said, I'm going to get ready to die. Well that didn't go over well. Qaughs) That, vftat, oh no. Well why should we slrouldn't really be surprised, I've since found out that Leonardo Da Vinci said, I thought I was leaming how to live but really I was leaming how to die. So his pretty good company for this. But I have thought about that a lot and so I am tryhg to, IVe all my life probably tried to reconcile loving life and being ready to let go. ... So that's part ofwhat I tried to try my students and now I'm too close (laughs) now I'm where, where it's, I've always felt close because really, no matter how old we are, we're close. So life is short, and we have to use it to the best, as best we can. So that's why I fought for what I thought was right. And I have to hope that I was. One time I lost a big battle, and one of my colleagues said, what are you going to do now? And I said, I'm going to hope I was wrong. I did the best I could and I'll hope I was wrong and I think I probably was. So. - 50.24 AF: 50.29 MK: Can you tell me, what you miss the most from your time at Augsburg? (augls) Yes. I miss one thing the most, I miss the big battles. I enjoyed those battles. I enjoyed fighting for what I thought was right and I, I enjoyed the excitement ofthe confrontations. I guess, I think that one of Chuck's favorite adjectives for me was, combative. Well, (laughs) I think that combating, is something that is wrong, that you think is wrong, is good. I think it's good to be combative. But, I did, a[ I was always combative with humor. There was always humor involved. But there was, a strong drive for what the issue or, you know, whatever, I was fighting for, I was, I loved kying to figure out how to make the argument in the best way. So I, I miss that. I miss that and I like he$ing somebody who needed help. I had one woman over her who had been fired one time, one time I could help her was at eleven o'clock till midnight. And she said, I feel so guilty having you do this but I was sitting there, trying to figure out hodd we could win our case. And she looked at me end said, you love this dont you? Yes. (laughs) Yes I do. Yes I do. So- I miss my students and I enjoyed especially towards the end. I had enjoyed advising them as they were coming in to one of the most exciting times in their life. When they're just going to college, changing, growing and going out at the beginning oftheir lives. That was a privilege to be a part ofthat. (tears) So I miss that. But I'm happy now too. I have, I could always be happy and figure out a re- I always tried to have, well if this works out this well, it will be good for this reason, if it works out and Frankie said to me, oh Pollyanna, I said, oh no, not Pollyanna. I know what it means to have bad things happen but you can always so appreciate good that can be found in the bad. So-right now, I'm painting, as I said, painting the coal bin, and the fumace room, painting the basement. So I'm fixing up my house but at the same time I've never realized so much that somebody else will be here someday- but in the meantime, I'm here and I'm enjoying it 53.35 53.40 AF: Well, thank you so much for your time, you being so open and honest. MK: You welcome. Can't help it. (aughs)
Show less
- Title
- Transcript of Oral History Interview with Peter Hendrickson, 2015
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Search Result
-
INTERVIEW WITH
PETER HENDRICKSON
AUGSBIJRG COLLEGE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT
Interviewed by Meridith Main
March
6th
2015
Augsburg College Archives
Interview with Peter Hendrickson
Interviewed at 221 1 Riverside Ave,
Minneapolis, MN, USA
Interviewed on March 6ft 2015
Augsburg College Oral H...
Show more INTERVIEW WITH PETER HENDRICKSON AUGSBIJRG COLLEGE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT Interviewed by Meridith Main March 6th 2015 Augsburg College Archives Interview with Peter Hendrickson Interviewed at 221 1 Riverside Ave, Minneapolis, MN, USA Interviewed on March 6ft 2015 Augsburg College Oral History Project Interviewed by Meridith Main Peter Hendrickson-PH Meridith Main-MM Time Los 00:02 MM: The following interview was conducted with Peter Hendrickson for the Augsburg College Oral History Project. It took place on March 6s, 2015 at Augsburg College. The interviewer is Meridith Main. Hi Peter. 00:15 PH: Hi Meridith. 00:17 MM: So, the 00:.22 PH: Okay, um, started in first question I have for you is to tell me about your time as an undergrad at Augsburg College. l972.Um,I basically was following my, my, didn't actually make Augsburg my, my, choice among many, I just simply followed. I had three older sisters and my oldest sister was at Gustavus as my parents went, as well, my older brother did that as well, we were all supposed to go to Gustavus because we wer€ Swedes. And my sister Sharon fell in love with somebody who was going to seminary here in Minneapolis/Saint Paul and um, she then transfered to Augsburg so that she could get married. Well then, my sister Rachel, the next one, sorta followed suit as my sister Rosanne and I sorta just did the same thing. I guess that's just what we did, and as much, very much, sort of a family orientation. But I didn't necessarily do it all for myself, Ijust did it because that's what you're supposed to do. Um, and it wasn't a bad choice sisters um at all. One of the things that was uh, really uh, prompting me to go was um, Gabe Gabrielsen, the college organist for forty sum years here, came out to Clarkfield to play for my sister Rachel's wedding, when I had just built a shop project. Oh sorry, I built a um, a harpsicord as a shop project, my uncle said, 'lvell why don't you buy a kit and make a harpsicord, you seem to like woodworking." So I bought a superman kit for $150 and then I, uh, as a shop project, put the case together and all of that, but uh but when Gabe came out, to um, to play the wedding, he came to our house, and sat down at the harpsicord and, started to play some Bach piece, and I was so taken by it that at that point in my life, you know I wanted to go and I want to live in the land that Bach walked. You know I made that choice at the age 15, but that's what I was going to do, I didn't know how I was going to do it or where, but I was going to do it. So anyway, I came to Augsburg, and my intention was to be um, a doctor, so I was doing the calculus, the chernistry, and physics, all of that sorta stuff. After the first semester, I got straight A's, but I also got an ulcer, so, I had also been starting music theory from day one, so I kinda thought, you know this science stuff is not really for me, so I, I, kept going with the science, because I actually did enjoy it, um, I kinda had a minor in the natural sciences, I did some biology, some chemistry, physics, calculus, but that was just for fun. But I was taking, I was taking some music theory, so that was uh, and I was in the choir, as a fluke in a way. Because I intended, I was an all-state trumpeter in high school. I had intended to join Mayo Savold's band that year, and I auditioned for the band, but I didn't make it. He had a lot of trumpets that year. But my sister Rachel said, "Well, you should try out for the choir." So, I tried out for the choir and Leland Sateren, who was the director at the time, and um took me, as a freshman. And I spent the next four years, um, studying with him and being in the Augsburg choir. And so he sorta became one of my first mentors. Um, I joined the choir and I went through it and in a couple years, in my junior year, we uh toured Norway in May, and I actually got elected president in my junior year and my senior year. Um, I enjoyed myself, I mean I really loved singing; I made some of my longest term friends in choir. So that's sort ofwhat happened at Augsburg. You want to ask another question? 04:31 MM: O4:40 PH: Oh yes, um, so since you said that Sateren was kind of your first mentor then um what type of style did he give to Augsburg? Well, it was very much the Lutheran college choir background, the Norwegian Lutheran sort of started F. Melius Christiansen um, St. Olaf and was at Concordia and um, Luther, Augustan4 it was all, it was basically that tradition, started because the immigrant Norwegians, Scandinavian, swedes, whatever, um, they weren't very wealthy. So, they didn't really have instruments to play. So, their instrument was their voice and the sound of the sort4 Lutheran tradition, was first to be like an organ, that's how it was intended to have that full richness, an orchestra could have that an organ does have, and to mimic that sort of combination of voices, like an organ would. So it was sort ofthe premise of the Lutheran college tradition, is that we're supposed to be an organ. That may sound really weird, but you can understand that there were no instruments, or very few anyway. Wealth was not among the Norwegians and swedes. 05:58 MM: I understand that you studied in Berlin correct? PH: I did, yes. 05:59 MM: 06:02 PH: Well, as I said Gabe Gabrielsen came out to Clarkfield, played my harpsicord when I was 15 and he had studied in Germany, uhm, and I studied German in high school, as I said I'm going to go to Germany and walk in the land where Bach walked. So, I would say that just that alone was the premise upon which I decided to go, was Gabe playing the harpsicord when I was 15 years old in my house, he had been to Germany. I was going to go to Germany. I was going to leam German. So. 06:39 MM: O6:46 PH: 05:54 and how did Augsburg set you up for that? Um, do you try and connect to the previous director's styles, or create a new directive for the choir? Well, um, it, well, it's sort of hard to say, I honor the past director's for sure, and I think every year that I've been here, this is my, 20,21"1year., every year I think I've done something by Leland Sateren, just to honor his hadition. I also have my own idea of vocal sound for example, Le had a very muscular sort of strength, strong, gutsy and it hurt actually, when I sang. After an hour and a half singing with him my voice often times would hurt, as he wanted so much muscle he kept drawing, mor€, more, more, louder, rrrrr. And I, and after I was at Augsburg I went to work with Dale Warland at Macalester and actually it was Le, Le Sateren, who recommended me for that job. When I went with Dale for those two years, at Macalester, uh, I could sing for five or six hours, and not hurt. So that's influenced my vocal production, sound, I don't try to make people sing, uh, any older age that they are, but I want them to sing ifthey're 16, I want them to sing like they're 16, but a full 16, but not pretend like yott'rc26.I think that does more harm than good for voices when you try and force them to sound at an age that they're really not. 08:19 MM: . Um, besides your duty with the Augsburg Choir and the Masterworks Chorale, what else do you do in the classroom to try and bring the Lutheran tradition out? 08:29 PH: Um, well, let's see, in choir, as I said in choir, I do stuffby Le Sateren, but I also do things by F. Melius Christiansen, Paul Christiansen, um, Rene Clausen, who is at Concordia now, um, just try, you know try and keep it alive, but you know things change over time and then the strength ofthat Lutheran choral tradition is not as strong, except for maybe at Concordia, St. Olaf, but you know and it dwindles in a sense, but, so, it's in a way up to me to decide you know to yes, I want to preserve it, honor it, keep, it. That's been a conscious choice of mine, is to you know, keep it alive. It has merit on its own and it's part of Augsburg History. I really think that tradition is honored and kept alive. 09:26 MM: 09:36 PH: Mmm. Well, for one thing diversity has many different meanings. The way I started, I've always been this way since I was you know 20 years old. I like languages. Uh, I've studied many languages, and my choirs over the years have, I think I've counted and I think we've sung in as many as 30 different languages over the 21 years I've been here. That to me is the ultimate diversity. The language of another culture becomes your own, and you can't help but understand it, and get into the culture just a little bit. That to me is uh, in choral music, the way you can show diversity. It is not necessarily who is up there, whether its white, black, Mexican, whatever, it doesn't matter, what matters is the music, for me, personally. I'll take anyone who can sing, anyone who has an ear. I uh, if they're qualified, I'll take them. But for me the diversity is most easily accessed t}rough, I think singing the language. My favorite language, for the choir to sing kr, is Russian. Ijust love that Russian sound. Low second basses, awwwwwww. l0:54 MM: l:14 PH: Ohwow. l:15 MM: To uh, what you have now? I 1 What types of measures do you try to take to um, to incorporate Augsburg's new and diverse community and student population? Um, so, it seems like you've been around the country, like for places to study, you've been at the Manhattan school of music, you've been to Columbia University, and Macalester and Augsburg, and tlen way over in Europe. So, how do you bring all different the pieces together? I l:16 PH: This is sort ofa hard question to answer easily. I guess, each one of those places, um, has influenced both me musically but also personally, and I actually have three times in my life when I felt like I was in a state of bliss. The one, the first one, was when I was in, at Holden Village. That was 78-80, I went up there as a cook, and I cooked for two years. I ended up doing all the music, I played all the Beethoven sonatas with my violinist that was there, but I skied every day in the winter time, I skied 6700 miles. I climbed 15 peaks. I was just in bliss at tlat point. And all I had to do was wake up at 4 in the moming and make the bread and cook until noon and I was offfor the rest of the day. It was great, I was in a state of bliss. And then the next one was when I went to Berlin. I was just lucky that I was at Holden Village, because the director ofthe Lutheran World Federation, at that time, came and he actually got me a spot in a great institute, which was the German language institute in Freiburg in 1981. From there I spent three years in West Berlin, when it was still West Berlin, and that was again a state ofbliss. I practiced the harpsicord for 6 hours a day. You know I went to the Kinieapa um, I just had a lot of fun, but I worked my butt off, I worked my tail offso much that I actually could have stayed. I had some enough gigging possibilities, and jobbing opportunities in West Berlin. Um, I could have stayed. I was a continual player for a Swedish chamber orchestra. So I could have made a life there, but I came back for various reasons. And then my next state ofbliss this is the third one now, was when I was in New York. I absolutely loved it, I loved living in New York. It's so ironic; you know everyone says New York is so loud and crazy. And I had an apartment, um, 400 sq. ft. aparEnent, 2 bedrooms, really small. But you know it was so quite in there you couldn't even hear the street. You come off into the building, go into the apartment; it's totally dead, dead silent. But there I studied harpsicord, I studied some conducting. Musicology at Columbia was really sort of was driving me at the time. So all of these things, I didn't really have a fi.rll time job, with benefits, and health and all that kind of stuff, until I was 35. So, I sort of took a very, very, circuitous route to get to a place where I actually had ajob. I was jobbing all the time. I had churchjobs and all that all the time, conducting things. But the real job where you have pension and benefits, and all that, until I was 35. l4:18 MM: So, you were on faculty at Macalester? Is that correct? l4:22 PH: Briefly, yeah. l4:'24 MM: Briefly? l4:.25 MM: l4:27 PH: No, I was, no no, I was, Macalester was very early on. That was right after college,T6-78. That I, uh, was assistant choral conductor at that time. No, I uh, came back from Berlin, no sorry, came back from New York and I went to Westminster Presbyterian Church downtown Minneapolis, and was the organist and choir director there for a number of years. Then the position opened up here at Augsburg and I was asked to apply and I was the first of three interims. Um, and then nobody took it, of those three interims, so they came back to me and said would you like it? And I said yep, I'll take it. I had had a really good experience as the interim conductor, so I thought, okay I can do this. 15:13 MM: l5 PH: 15: So then you left there and came to Augsburg? What is an interim? Oh, interim. The former conductor had left mid-year, so I came in as the first to do the last semester ofthat year. And they did a search but couldn't find anyone they wanted, so then the next year there was somebody in the fall and somebody in the spring to fill the position while they searched again. And then that's when I put my hat in the ring there and said, yep okay I'll consider it. 15:41 l5:44 MM: And whose position did you fill? PH: It was Tom Rosen. Well, Le Sateren, and then Larry Fleming and then Tom Rosen, and then I was the next one in line, yeah. l6:00 16 :05 16 :06 16:07 16:09 MM: So you said you're Swede by um, heritage... PH: Swede, Fin MM: Swede, Fin PH: Don't forget that Fin part! MM: Sorry, so then how do you, do you try and bring that into the Norwegian at all? l6:14 PH: Actually, 16:15 MM: Or, l6:16 PH: Oh sorry. l6:17 MM: No, go ahead. 16:18 PH: Oh, um I, it's interesting because uh, um, Le Sateren, he was, you know, Scandihoovian, you know as they say as Norwegian as they get. He was very instrumental in bringing sort of contemporary Scandinavian music; particularly from Norway into the United States, he created a relationship with Knut Nystedt. Um, who was a Norwegian composer and conductor. In fact Knut came over here for a year and they sort of exchangedjobs. He went to Bergen, I think, and oh no Nystedt was just on the faculty, that's what it was. But he was here for a whole year and Sateren premiered many, many works of Nystedt. So that continued because when I was uh, my fifth year or so, there was a commission ub see Halverson, I can uh, anyway, somebody commissioned Knut Nystedt to write a piece for the Augsburg Choir. Uh, and so we premiered that and it was, uh, 1998 or something like that. So then I've done lots ofworks by uh Scandinavian composers that's sort ofbeen what, what, uh, Sateren started out doing is doing a lot of stulfyou know by Scandinavian composers, and in fact, you know the piece we uh, in choir, um we end concerts with is um Stay With Us is from Egil Hovland he is a Norwegian. It's from his opera Captive & Free. 18:03 18:07 MM: How has the music program evolved since your time as a student? PH: Ah ha, good question. Well, um, when I came um, I had a very small Augsburg Choir, and only a few handfrrl it was kind ofa program that had diminished a biL so I had to rebuild that. When I first came, one of my, part of my job is to do the Masterworks Chorale. Which is a town and gown group um, students, audition students, faculty, staff, friends, alums, um all lumped into a symphonic chorus. That's the one rqrertoire that Augsburg has never been able to do, the full choral orchestral literature like Mozart's Requiem and Brahms' Requiem that kind of thing. So, I changed the format a little bit, making four choirs and no one was competitive. Whe'n I was in college there was the Augsburg Choir and there was the Choral Club. The Choral Club were always felt like they were second rate, and I vowed never to have anyone feel second rate. So, I started the Augsburg Choir was there, I started the Masterworks, which was symphonic chorus. The repertoire is different. I started in the Riverside Singers and then evolved into the Cedar Singers as well, so we had a men's group, women's group, symphonic group, and an a Capella group. So no one, no one has to go across the board and say you're better than I, no we do different things. That was my, that has, I reached that goal. I mean it's happening now as we speak. It's never going to be a huge program, but it never was. It's vibrant and alive with those four choirs. 19:.47 MM: How has the music program in general grown, like the band, and the classes? 19:55 PH: Well, one big thing is we keep adding classes, although they keep money taking away from us. Which is unfortunate, uh, maybe I wasn't supposed to say that, but I did, too bad. One thing that we've done was uh, which was sort of our gift to the community is the Advent Vespers, where we have everybody involved. That actually was started by Larry Fleming who followed Le Sateren. He started it in 1981 and as a matter of fact, I was actually part of that first Advent Vespers. I was working at the seminary as a cook, but at the same time I was doing the choral club, so to speak, for that one semester when Larry started it, so I was there at the very first Advent Vespers. But, anyway, it continued from '81 and then I came in '94, and it had been going on each ofthose years, so that we've really kind of charged ahead. Starting out with four services with maybe 500 per service to five services now with maybe I 5,1 8,2000 per service so that is really, it has really mushroomed and grown. I think that is departmental thing as well, it is notjust the choral program. The instumental program, the orchestr4 the faculty play alongside students in a mentor situation, it is really, that's probably one of the biggest crowning achievements, I think during my time here, that we've gone that far with it. Yeah, I'm very proud of that. 2l:31 MM: 2l:33 PH: Yeah you know! You know the drill. MM: So, you're a part of the Midnimo? PH: Midnimo, yes. MM: Yes, Midnimo, can you explain that a bit? PH: Well yeah, Midnimo is the Somali word for unity. The Cedar 2l:37 2l:42 2l:45 2l:46 Well, it's a great show. Cultural Center got a big grant to combine, um, Somali music at the Cedar and Cultural exchange at Augsburg. So I have, so they asked me to have one ofthe cohorts um, people from the choir, my cohort, so to speak, and we've um, had the Somali's music in our classrooms, we have gone to their concerts at the Cedar Cultural Center. It's a way to cross over you know the boundary between two different cultures and to at least understand, not necessarily assimilate, but to understand each other through music, basically. Because all the residencies are, ar€, musicians, bands, or single. It's a great project. 22:43 MM: How long do you expect it will continue? 22:46 PH: Well, right now it is just this first year, there is only one year. I think it is the Doris Duke Foundation that put a grant in for the, this year to do I think, five different residencies, but beyond that I don't know what would happen. 23:02 MM: Finding different residencies meaning what? PH: Yeah well, an artist comes in and is here for a week. A week's 23:05 residencies so to speak, and then he goes away and then another one comes in and she stays and goes away. So we have five discrete bands coming in. 23:21 MM: 23:31 PH: Well, my singers I think love music. I think they like me. They like to sing, they better anyway. I'm being, not arrogant, but it's true. I think my students love to sing and I, I can't do anything else but you know facilitate their singing so, it's just sort of who I am. Music just oozes out of my pores and I share it with my students. It's pretty easy actually. It's like a no brainer for me. 24:07 MM: What types of things have you leamed and brought them to the classroom tlrough your conducting and just your love of music? Where do you think the music program here at Augsburg is headed in the within the next... PH: 24:13 Well I hope it's headed upwards and onwards, um, the school at this point in time is having struggles with um, finances, and that's always a question as to what happens and how it works. So, I'm not quite sure but we are plugging ahead. I'm recruiting as many singers as I possibly can. I have lots of really good singers, fine arts scholars are coming in. We've got a lot of endowed scholarships, named scholarships, they call them. So we, and we're out in the community, I think there is an Augsburg group out in the community probably five times a week somewhere, somehow, and tlat's a lot. 24:58 MM: 25:02 PH: When you say they're out in the community, doing things what? Concertizing, choir goes to a mass at the Basilica, j""z land 9695 out on, er, gospel praise goes out on a Sunday moming to a place. We've got students playing in clubs around the area um, some ofthem have gotten their start through being at Augsburg and connecting with other singers and instrumentalists, creating their own bands. 25:28 MM: 25:35 PH: 26:ll MM: How do you try and keep up with the times of evolving music and Do you have any part or part that you play in the music therapy program? I don't, although I believe all music is therapeutic. That is, I understand music is therapeutic because it touches the soul. It's got an energy that um, is connected to the spheres and ether and all that, there are sign waves that go through our bodies that affect us. Acoustics prove that. I just feel that you know, music is everywhere. the new styles and everything? PH: 26:19 Well, um, again I'll go back to doing things in different languages. Um, there's been a lot of multicultural things happening where you're working with music from New Guinea, for example, I mean the doors, and the intemet, has basically opened up the door for us musicians as well. Suddenly, we can get a printed score from someone in South Africa or from the mid part of China. There's one company called Earthsongs which has produced a lot of , lots of, songs from the Earth, so to speak, from all over, from around the world. I do a lot of, I've done, as I say, I've done stuff in a lot of languages, intentionally. Because I think that brings us closer as humans of the world. 27:22 PH: 27:23 MM: 27:37 PH: Am I doing okay? You're doing great. One ofmy most favorite concerts, I'lljust back up for a second, I work for Dale Warland and the Dale Warland singers, and he um, there was a woman named Marie Gannon, whose still alive, she's from Venezuela, fantastic conductor, and Dale brought her um, in to do a whole concert of Latin American music, and I, I um, got to prepare the Dale Warland singers for it in advance of her coming. I'll tell ya, that was one ofthe best concerts I've ever been part of. I actually didn't sing in it or conduct it, but I prepared the choir ofall those pieces, um, they were complicated! Some of those pieces from Venentela arc very, very diffrcult to sing. Rhythmically, and texturally as well, it's got some difficulty. use to 28:22 MM: Do you take part in bringing new, not necessarily new, but u[ the performers here, or anything related to just maybe chapel, or maybe the convocations or anything? 28:38 PH: 28:54 MM: Um, I'm not a part of that, I did the chapel as a part of the interim for about two years. Um after Gabe passed away, um, I took over for a couple years before they found somebody to do it on a permanent basis. So you said that you went on tour when you were an undergrad here. 28:58 PH Yeahmhm. 28:58 MM: So, has tour for the Augsburg Choir always been something in the works? 29:02 PH: 29:26 MM: Oooooo 29:,27 PH: Yeahhhh. 29:.28 MM: 29135 PH: Culturally rich and musically rich on both ends, yeah. I, we go, well, now a days you go anywhere in the world and it is music rich. Um, all the very different kinds of music. 29:50 MM: What do you think touring brings back to Augsburg? 29:55 PH: Um, global understanding for sure, um, connection to a wider community. The intemational tours are eye opening for some people, something they never forget. I went on the, I went to Norway with the Augsburg Choir in '75 and I'll never forget some ofthose things, like, I wrote the King of Sweden a letter to come to our concert in Stockholm. I was being bombarded by all of these Norwegians and I thought, "Hey I'm a Swede!" So I wrote a letter to him, he didn't come I don't think, but the invitation was there. You know that's a cross cultural exchange right there you know. I'm trying to get the king of Sweden to come to a concert. That wouldn't have happened if we hadn't have gone on an overseas trip. 30:43 MM: Yep. When I started in 1994, I want to go every four years some intemational tour. We have been able to do it. '98 we went to Scandinavia, 2002 we went to Finland. 2006 we went to Hungary, Czech Republic. 2010 we went to China. 2014 we went to Ireland. My next hope is to go to Iceland. Are you, for the places that you try and chose to go, are they musically rich or what are you trying to find? Have you ever tried to take them, the Augsburg Choir, back to Germany and show them around or anything? PH: 30:51 Um, well, we did one year, that year we want to Scandinavi4 in 1998. We started out in Germany, I was the conductor of the Leipzig, Leipzig choral festival for many years, and the Augsburg Choir was part of that in 1998. That was about as close as we got, but I haven't been back to Germany per say with the Augsburg Choir, it is very expensive these days. Europe in general is expensive. 3l:25 MM: So you are taking, or pieces of the Augsburg Choir to New York City... 3l:32 31 :33 31 :35 3l:41 3l:44 PH: Yep. MM: In a week or so, aren't you? PH: Yeah well, let's say two weeks, don't rush into these things. MM: And you're going to sing at Camegie Hall, PH: Camegie Hall, yep, I'm going to conduct a piece by Morten Latidsen, Lw Aeterna. lt's a large mass choir, 83 ofAugsburgites from alums, see um, Augsburg Choir, Masterworks, alums, and some guests as well. We 83 going, and there is another chorus from Virginia that will join us on these pieces. The other guy conducts one piece, Doug Mears is his name, um, and I conduct the piece Lux Aeterna. 32:16 MM: And how did you get to be able to do it? l8 PH: He called me up, asked me to do it. It's Mid-American productions 32: in New York. They have a lot of conductors come through. They might, it's a way to sing in Camegie Hall, it's their signpost, you know, "Wanna sing in Carnegie Hall? Well we can make it work." So it's very appealing to singers to be able to say, "Yeah I sang in Camegie Hall." Um, so yeah, look forward to conducting there. 32:46 MM: 32:51 PH: Have you been offered many um, conducting opportunities? Yeah over the years, lots ofclinics. I do, probably, six or seven clinics every year with high school choirs. Um, I do festivals, yeah all kinds of stuff. 33:05 MM: How do you think that your time at Augsburg and around the country and in Berlin and things set you up to have such a wide reach in different festivals and such? I 33: l8 PH: Well word of mouth a lot, well are you in the know or not? Do you go to conventions and talk to people and get to know school directors? Stuffjust comes out from networking, I think, more than anything else. They know that a product will be good. Augsburg has a reputation in terms of choral music and I think people know that so they would trust that whoever is there will come in and work with their festival or choir. 33:51 MM: 34:O4 PH: 34:47 34:50 How do you try and keep Augsburg expected outcome of product compared to all the other choirs in our... Well, I try not to think about competitiorl although because we are one ofthese Lutheran colleges, I have no choice but to consider it. I prefer not to, I prefer to go sideways; I'm not going to try and go over the top, that's pointless. It's not really thinking about your students. Your students are mor€ important than the 'lre're better than" some other college. There's always been some banter back and forth between Concordia and St. Olafand Augsburg and Luther. They all have good programs. I like the conductors, I like the music, but I do my own thing. That's the way it has to be. MM: Do you have a lot of athletes in your choir? PH: Not so much, but I've worked very hard to find ways to make it work. I've had some football players, a woman who plays lacrosse this year, track people, that's about it I think. There's probably been about one or two or three that I've had to kind of coordinate timing within the athletic department. 35:16 MM: How do you try and get them to join if they have a prefty good voice? 35:22 PH: 35:47 MM: What do you think your legacy will be... 35:51 PH: Oh boy... 35:52 MM: at Augsburg? Well, I just walk up to them and say do you sing? They say no, I say why not? I've gotten lots of people by just asking well why not? Well I don't have a good voice, and then they audition for me and I say well yeah you got a good voice. So, it's beating the bushes, knocking on the door, seeing someone and say, "Hey I like the way your voice sounds, do you sing?" No, oh well why not? 35:53 PH: My legacy. Ha. Ijust hope I have legs when I leave here, how is that? No I just want to make good music with people. My job as conductor is to facilitate my singers, teach them good music, teach them how to sing, and get that out ofthe way. So, it's more important that the students are serviced instead of I'm just servicing my own ego or my own legacy guess. I don't even think about that. 36:29 PH: So, the legacy line and not mine. 36:40 MM: will probably I be someone else's decision down the I'll just do my thing. So, um, the main point of this interview was to see how your time as a student in the music and the choral program is compared to your time as a member ofthe faculty now, and conductor of all the choirs. How do you think those two correlate or match? 36:58 PH: Oh they don't at all because I never wanted to be the Augsburg Choir director. It never occurred to me. I was an instrumentalist, I sang all the time, I conducted choirs, but I was going to be a musicologist for a while. That's what I was at Columbia, get a Ph.D. in musicology. I was a harpsichordist when I came to Augsburg in that first semester interim, I wasjust there to help them out. I wasn't looking for ajob, I had a great job. So, in some ways I sort ofjust fell into this, it's not something when I was a student at Augsburg, "oh I hope I can be like Le Sateren and be the conductor ofthe Augsburg Choir." That never existed in my mind and suddenly I was like, oh okay, I guess I can, it was in my face. I guess I better do it then. 37:50 MM: Was it a happy fall? 37:52 PH: Yea[ pretty good. Yeah, it's had its moments here and there. By job. in large, I don't hate my Hahah4 there are times when I love it. I hate rehearsals most ofall. Ill tell ya, I get some sort ofanxiety that I cannot get rid of, once I'm in it I'm fine but I don't like to prep for rehearsals, I don't like how it feels. They seem odd, because I've done about 2,500 rehearsals and I counted them one time, like x number per year, okay that adds up to this, and this is about 2,500 rehearsals, I think I've done over the 34 years. 38:31 MM: My goodness. 38:32 PH: Yeah. I know my goodness. 38:33 MM: 38:39 PH: Yeah, musicology, yeah. 38:41 MM: What exactly is that? 38l.42 PH: Well, it's um, it's sort of, well mine was historical musicology. That is um, studying music history in depth um, keatises, people usually pick a specific area to study. Mine was going to be um, Mahler's use of early music, that was going to be my dissertation, but I left New York to come back and have babies. That's basically what it was. 39:19 MM: 39:22 PH: Well they were already gone. They're done with school No they didn't come here. My daughter went to Grinnell and my son went to the University of Denver. So they had the opportunity to look all around and they had friends in their school that looked all around too. Of course Augsburg was a consideration, but I let them where their heart landed, you know. That's the best way. 39:52 MM: Um, earlier you said you wanted to get your doctorate in musicology? Are your children going to follow your footsteps and come here? If you could summarize the choral tradition at Augsburg College in a sentence, what would you say? 40:02 PH: 40:29 MM: Do you think that Le Sateren was the one who set off Augsburg's Uh, a tradition bom out of Norwegian immigrants with love for music, a love for the lord, so to speak, and its inception, and always, always, always, trying something new, I guess. That's what I would say, Le Sateren sort of started that, looking for something new all the time, but steeped in that Lutheran tradition. music progtam or was it always at the top? 40:38 PH: Yeah, no, he was here from about you know 1949-1980, that's a long time, thirty-some years I think it was. He is the one who brought the music program, you know, to the floor. He was sort of like the F. Melius Christiansen there and the Paul Christiansen there and Weston Noble at Luther. He was the guru at Augsburg I guess. 4l:09 MM: 4l:10 PH: PH: 41:13 The guru. Yes. Prolific composer too, he wrote lots of music. 4l:17 MM: 4l:79 PH: Have you done any composing? Yeah, I do a lot ofarranging, orchestrating. Because I'm an organist I orchestrate pretty easily. We're always drawing stops so you know to make a certain sound on the organ, same thing with diving out instruments, in a piece for vespers for example, I orchestrate a lot ofthose. 4l:45 MM: What do you think is the next step for the choral program here is? PH: More. 4l:46 MM: 4l:47 PH: 42:01 MM: 42:06 PH: 4l:19 More? More singers, more music, more touring, more frrn. I don't know anything more than that. Just keep going, just keep going. Well Peter, thank you! Thank you Meridith! It's been fun, I babbled didn't I?
Show less
- Title
- Transcript of Oral History Interview with Jim Trelstad-Porter, 2017
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Search Result
-
-
--
..
--
.
···-- ·-·--·
-
--
.. -·--·-
.... -·
.
--·..
..
- --. -·
·--· ..
- . .. ..
--
--·.
___.,__._ __
---- ---- ----· ----- INTERVIEW.WITH·---·JIM TRELSTAD PORTER
AUGSBURG COLLEGE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT
Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock
March 9, 2017
··--·
-·
.........
Show more - -- .. -- . ···-- ·-·--· - -- .. -·--·- .... -· . --·.. .. - --. -· ·--· .. - . .. .. -- --·. ___.,__._ __ ---- ---- ----· ----- INTERVIEW.WITH·---·JIM TRELSTAD PORTER AUGSBURG COLLEGE ORAL HISTORY PROJECT Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock March 9, 2017 ··--· -· ........ •.!.. • _--ii::.::...,_: • • ,,,; -•· ·--·· • : ____ _.....,: . . . · ··- - ; \ -· .:. ·- ··-. ·:-_- .... . . . . . : :·.:.: ... ··.:,: .. Jim:Trelsfad- Interview with Jim Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ·_ ~nt~ryie~ed ·on March_ 8~_20.17 Augsburg Oral History Project . . - . ... . - - -- -- . . -. Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock ... ···-··-· --- .. - -. -- ... -- - .. - -· Porter·~·-rn ·:--'::.:...:.:..=--, . ..-__,_ L .... : .Jwokamer..Deb.o.ck-ID ... :.- ...: ::· __·. __ .-·: . . :~· ... - . --·- - -. -····· . -·- ·: . ~. .- .. - ·- .. • ...' . -.· ........ : - .. ......,. · - . ...... . :- ~ . .. Time Lo& 0.01 JD: The following interview was conducted with Jim Trelstad - Porter on behalf of the Augsburg Archives for the Augsburg Oral History Project.It took place on March 8th 2017 at the Admissions office at Augsburg. The interviewer is Jwokamer Debock. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your background, your education? 0.28 JTP: Alright, do you want to know about just my education before coming to Augsburg? So I graduated from another Lutheran private Liberal Arts institution in South Dakota Augustana and I majored in International Relations, Spanish and Theology and then I actually went on an Augsburg College program my final semester of my senior year in 1988 in Mexico. Augsburg had a program offered through the Center of Global Education called program and Global Community and that was a very significant program in everything I've done ever since and that was also my introduction to Augsburg. 1.13 JD: How did you get the information, how did you find out about the opportunity? - Interview with Jim Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interviewed on March 8,--2017 · Augsburg Oral History_ Proj~ct Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock . . - Jitrt ti-clstiid~ Porter _: JTP .. .. . ; . ....... . .:...-:. ___ ;_ ■ • ■ .- .:.. _.: . ~ ··- . •· • . : . . .. ..,, __:_ .• • ..• - • .. - . -· ·---; i . . .: ....:,..__..·_ : __ . · -• • 1.23 -:.. - - ~ .,__ •.· ■ .-· -~ :_·,: ... · ___;._.:.., ··-·•·.:.· --.- ---- .. -· ----- .- _r_~...:,:. .. - - :.::-· JTP: I was looking for a program that focused on Social Issues and" Social analysis that was really the only ones being offered that had this type of a focus to sort of engage a cross border global issues. After that program I committed somewhat to going deeper into working on similar issues to the types that I was exposed to by the program and I ended up getting a Masters degree in Latin American Studies from the American University in Washington D.C. While out there I actually started working for a small office for Augsburg College because we had a small office out there that did fundraising and promotion for the Center for Global Education at Augsburg. So I would go to different Universities on the East Coast and promote our programs in Mexico, Central America and then we were opening the program in Namibia shortly after that. During my Masters I was already working for Augsburg in that program and then directly out of my Masters I was hired to teach in the Mexico site so I taught for four and half years in the programs that I had originally attended back in 1988 so I was a part of that team for a little more than 4 years in the mid 1990s from 1993 to 1997. __ - - ·- "!,."";_ ... • ··.- ·.- -· .::• • -· Interview with Jim _,Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn --- ----_ -~ lntervie"."ed on March 8, 2017 -____-·-_ Aug~b_urg Oral ffistory Project_ ... Interviewed by. Jwokamer Debock ... ·- ... - ·-· .. - .. - - ..... .. . .. . . ......... ·- .. . . . ....... • • ■ :.H•_~.:.. . :.·:.: ·_ :Jini Trelstad~~Porter--- -JT-P.:.: · . ·-: .. ::- .-_: ... :.. _: -~ -~- ..:·: :_- .~:-~= . - .· ·_ :;.. _ _-·. • • • • • • • -·--·. • ••• --- - • • - • • • • _:_,_ '·'·--:.::."....... ,·~::·· -~-" .JwokamerDebock-_JD_ ... --·. _ .. _. .. • - ••• •·· • - --· •• ----. • • . • •• .-;.--· - .#' - • ··:·· - . • - .: - •· 3:02 JD: Can you tell us a little more about what you did or taught i:r;i Mexico? 3:08 JTP: Yes, Our approach to Education was largely in dispensary and the type of job I held was a Program Coordinator which meant that I taught or assisted in a number of courses. One of the was International Models of Social Work so the social work theory was done a in conjunction with an Augsburg professor that would be visiting and then a lot of the teaching I did was setting up the meetings in the communities with folks involved in both formal and informal efforts that one might consider related to the field of social work and co facilitating reflections sessions on those. Experiential Education I would say, at it's best, that's what Augsburg has done here in Minneapolis but also in sites elsewhere. I was also involved in a course called the Development process which included different facets of Political Science and cross border issues that were being looked at in Mexico. I also worked with a program called Women and development which later became gender and development which looked·at different lenses to approach and grounded-in gender identity and what it meant to engage the different issues that were happening both in Mexico but also . . . .... . ·-· - - . 'I,/' ... 1- - ·........ laterview with Jim Trelstad - Porter --- - -· -•·-· Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interviewed on-March 8,--2017· --. _A_~gsburg Ora~ Hist~ry Project Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock ···--· - -·· • :• ... .. • ... ·• I . ---- --•-••-=- • . . . :. ..... .. -, ..... ··. · .. •.·· ··.···-·---.:-:- ..... - •~&.•••• .. ,• •.·.~ ·- .·--- ... -~---- ·- -- - ..- . •• " ,.,..-J •,.;...._,L - • • ••-•• - -- -- 'l,. •• 1--. ·•-· • -. -~~ bunch of short term groups, Church groups, nonprofits groups, and Minnesota Human Rights lawyers, Kellogg Fellows, professors from different universities focusing on particular issues of interest such as the North American Free Trade Agreement which was signed in 1993. We focused on root causes of poverty, we focused on bilateral issues in the United States and Mexico all of those sorts of things. JD: How was the experience of teaching or program coordinator different from going to learn? 6.08 .. ; .- . -·- - . ···• -·· --.._.-. ;:_· - ...... ·- ... . . comparatively in Central America and the United States. We also worked with a 5.56 . - ·.: - : JTP: I think the fundamental is that I was responsible now for everybody else. We probably averaged 90 to I 00 hours a week because the type of work we did required lots of time to set things up because it was grounded in personal relationships. We had relationships across all sectors of society so maintain those and building trust required- time. -I was a chauffeur I drove 15 passenger vans and tried to· played tag with two other vans while we were buzzing through 8 lanes traffic in Mexico City. I .; _:::.·-- .·---,-.• . .. .. --· . ·-··· lntervjew with Jim ·Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ·- - ·Interyiew~d _o~ M·~rc~ ~' 2017 Augsburg 9ral History Project ·- ·--. .. -----··-· Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock . ··--··. ··-· . . . -· . -. . -· .. : :~_.:.-.-.:~:-:· ::::·:- Jirii Trelsfad-: Porter.- .JTP .-~--~--~- -~ =·:. ~·_;;_~ H• •• Jwokamer D.ebock-JD.:· .. - .. - . . . . ... - - . • .• . •. -· ... t •. •_;_•_ ••_. ~w~~ - -· ....... .· .-···-.· • ..• :.:. ---~~-- -~~-. -~ '": was emergency responder for health issues somebody get stung by a scorpion, has typhoide, has whatever we had to be first responders. We set up family stays in rough conditions, we had families who didn't have phones, we had families living at the bottom of ravines, in different area we had known and even at that time for ten to 15 years. For example I'm still contacted with my host family from 1988 which is almost 30 years now. The program has deep and broad context in the regions in which it operates. 7.47 JD; You said you also worked in D.C., can you tell us a little more? 7.56 JTP: That was an attempt for a couple of year where the Center for Global Education office on Augsburg had to be self funded a lot of their work and so in that office there were intentional fundraising efforts with former participants from the Center for Global Education short term travel seminars either to Mexico, Central America or regions in the world. There were a number of those folks out in the D.C area or the surrounding area and so there was a donor-relation aspect I was not responsible for but helped support it. My biggest moment of glory was going up to : ·-:- ·,Interview with -Jim Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interviewed on· March 8, 2017 A~gsburg Oral History Project_ Interviewed by.jwokamer··»ehock --~~~~- ~ ... : . :~ --_ . .. Jim Trdstad-:.. ·Poiter ..:-)n>· .- . · ·· ·_·::_,~,--y_-~~ -..i:...: ...: Jwo~ai;i:ier PebQck- J1) . ·...... ·- . - . . . . . .. -- -· .. •·· ... . .. . . . ·- . .. - . .; - . ..· -· .. . - New York City and helping Peter Yarrow from the 1960s Folk group Peter, Paul and Mary. I spent the day with his housekeeper setting up for our joint fundraising party with Oxfam International which is a very well known international development organization. Oxfam was a support of the center. Peter Yarrow has gone on several of our trips and is a big supporter of the center. I supported that work even though I wasn't in charge of that. The other part. was simply recruiting, going to different schools such as William and Mary, American University, Georgetown University to all these schools and fairs and talking to perceptive students about coming to the programs. 9.37 JD: It sounds like Augsburg has had a strong relationship or International Studies program (Global Education) can you tell us about what region students come from,or where augsburg sends students as of today? How has it developed? 10.25 . ......... . .-. . JTP: It's part by choice, part by accident, Just like Augsburg History here in Minneapolis, during the Race Riots of the 1960s it formed something called The Crisis Colonies which Sociologist here named Joel Torstenson was deeply involved Interview with Jim Trelstad- - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ·--~-:-···---· - Interviewe~i--:~n March 8, 2017 ·· · Project _ ___ .. Augsburg Or,al... Hist~ry -- . - . - ... ... -- -· ... .. ... - . .... -···· ..... -· . -· . ···_ -~~t~rv~~we~ b~ -~w~~ame(I~!~~~~ ... _ ... .- . . .. - • - • .,. •- ·. ·~:_·:·: · Jim-:Trelstad- Porter -JU>.: _.--_·,__,_,;_-:-..~- ._:; ·~-.:..~~- Jw.okamerDebock.- JD.~- - ... • • • a ■-•••• "'" •'■ • "" -· - ••• ••• ,r • • •• •• .... - ■ - • •• . •I• •• • •• • - .. ■ • • ■• • • - • ■ ■ .... • ■ • '' •' ••• ••- ■•-. • . . ■ •• • ••••••• •• • •• ■ • • • •• • - - .. ,&, • ■■ • •••• -- . •• •• •• lo, • •• •• -- ' •••••• ■ ■ " I ... ' • - .. ■ ·-· - ■■ I •&..-<II - ' " •••••••• •• - • -- -- -- - ■ - •••--••••• ' " •• • ■ ■ .... • "" •• - • . · • • - .. , . • • .. ••• ' • ' - ' • • • •• ' --· • •••••• • ' ·- A ' : . ■ I O • 1 ■■ -I Io■ I ' • : • ' -~ • ■■ . . . . . . . . . • •• - ..... . -·. .... .- . ..:: in shaping Augsburg's commitment to being in the city, to people of all immigrant background which had always been apart of Augsburg's history. So Augsburg became the founding member of Higher Education Consortium for Urban Affairs(HECUA). I mean Augsburg has always been deeply involved in social issues, issues of justice and equality even though it hasn't always been named that and it's messy to be involved. I think that entrepreneurial innovative spirit permeated early efforts to be involved in things that were going on in Mexico and wars raging in a number of countries in Central America so there was a tramous of U.S. foreign policy money being spent in these regions. Thousands of people were being killed and fleeing to the United States so we were deeply involved while much of the population knew little about what was going on. The Center for Global Education was involved in efforts to continue to educate U.S. citizens about what we were doing in the region. There was a sanctuary movement in for Central American refugees throughout the United States where Churches and individuals were providing refuge to folks who were in a situation very similar to what we're experiencing today. Augsburg was· very committed to ·having people understand those issues so we would meet with policy makers,decision makers, political folks I, 6 • •0"' • ·••oi••·. .: -;;.:::··: r·- '~·::rj,~-ti::-'·::::-:~~\~·--"'~-;-- - .. . - . ·-·. ~-- ...- ~- :~--- ·_: .:·. ~ .. =- ··- . -.,. Interview with-1Ji-m- Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interviewed on March- 8; 2017 A1~gsburg Oral ~istory Project Jwokamer Debock Interviewed by -·- jfui ~Trilit8d=■ POrtei .:. JTP. - · ;::_::::: -.-~-: -~=-=_.:~-- -__ Jwo~am~:r..P.el>oc~- _JI). ... ·. -:.~~_. •.:· _.· -·. .-: :.. : .···•~ ... ·,.-i:·.__ - -· ;_ . . ·•. ------ .. ::- -- - ..... .. . - . ....... . . . ·:- = ;. .. .. . . ..... and lots of people directly. In fact, we were on both sides of the issues so people can think critically about what was occurring. That ethos also expanded to Namibia once it achieved it's independence. We had post-apartheid movements in South Africa and so the Center's program developed again into a very unique set of experientially based programs looking at issues of developments, what development means, of issues of gender and development, of issues of what does it mean to decolonize the mind. All kind of issues. So our programs in Namibia would regularly travel to South Africa both to Capetown and Johannesburg and they still do today. So really again that same sort of ethos, I think earlier on being more impacted by the direct news of the day, as the center continue to evolve just a deeper understanding commitment of what the educational philosophy was, what it means to be educator in this context where you 're intentionally exposing people to differing viewpoints and trying to find information from all perspectives and help people think it through for themselves but not to try and control the agenda I think that's what fundamentally separated the Center for Global Education as an educational institution. As someone committed to that process that with the exposure of people having access to lots of voices and opinions and good information that people will ·•· . . ... . .... - -- .. . -·· .. -· ~ . . - . - · ;,. ,.....~lffle:rview with Jim Trelstad - l>o-rte-r ·- :....-1,..-.. -,~·;r.· · · Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ------ ·-- ------ -- --- ·------ -- Interviewe~ on March 8, 2017 _ _·-·__ . Augs~urg O_ral_History ~roj~~t .. . .. ... ____ ___I~t~-~~"!ed by ~~oka~er De~~ck :·_ . .:· ~--~-:_::- .: :·~: "Jiin-Trelstad..:-Porler:·::]rP· :---~-~ :~ ::·___ :.-. ·:_.·_::.: -- .:.:.··_-_: : ; ··_ ·-::~. --- - -:.: -_ ~::-.~·::·.:-.. _::.:.._.-.-~.-~- --- --- -Jwokamer-Debock-dD·___ ·__ _-___-__ ·_:·~- _______ ·___-__ _-_ - __ -__ ··:: ..-.. ~----_:. • .... come better informed opinions in their personal lives, in their communities, as well as in their global works. I think that that differentiates the center and has for many decades over groups that have particular agenda that they are trying to implement weather that something I agree with or not that has not really been the center. Even though it's certainly true that the center has always emphasized active citizens, people who are engaged, people who do understand that to live is to be political beings but again without trying to narrowly control people's agendas. I think within University programs there is vecy little that has been done I guess over so many year as the consistently as what the center has been able to do. Nothing is perfect but it's been an amazing group of people who have worked for Augsburg at these sites and many of whom are still there today. With such an incredible relationship network in how it has been maintain, build and sustain on behalf of Augsburg and the work itself that has been accomplished just by people who we had contact with. If we could gather the information of all the people who could come through those programs, there are thousands and thousands of people. They're holding huge positions all over the country and many of whom we know about. It's amazing to hear people talk about the role that program played in teaching them how to think .. .. - . -- . . . . -·· ..• .:: = •••~. -•-•. • • • :.:,:._:_ =c ·,;'_=~~·-_,:-i~?.}~_(;:::.::.: --Interview with Jim Tr.elstad -- Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn -Interviewed on March- 8, 2017 - ---- - -- - · ... A.~gsburg Oral History Project _ ·Interviewed by Jwokamer-i>eli"ock ____ --- ----- -- -- - . - ---- -.-·::·:···,•--:······:;.;;:·.: --~:-•:.-.~:i:--..... . . ·- . - -~ .. -.. :· -~- - .... '. .Jim Trelstad... Porter·:- JTP ·-- .=--: ;::- ·: ·_· ~-: .: :... , ·- _Jw0Jq1mer Oebock.-:-· JP_ . .. ·-· ·- --· -·· . . • .•• -·--. --- - . ■ - • • • • • ................... ·••··· ■ . •• ·-•-·••-.. . ··-·· •• ••••• .......... ··-···· . -_. ,. :.=: ... . . ...... . -· ···-· . ••••• •• -~ • - -~ :- ■ • : critically about different issues in a way that keeps them learning and keeps them connected. 16.22 JD: You talked about there being challenges or going to countries where wars were taking place. Was hard to get people to participate with the program? 16.32 JTP: Not as much in those days. Think about it the internet was not as popular. We had students intentionally when I was teaching in Mexico writing their papers by hand because the computers would regularly go down due electricity spikes and so on. We had one of our colleague who worked in the office in Namibia was clear across the office during a thunderstorm because a lightning bolt blew up the computer in from of him. He was okay in the end. Things were simply less regulated in study abroad or off campus studies as known today. Parent were not as demanding in terms of safety and security on every possible level regarding things that really one can't control in one's own city much less when you go somewhere - · ---- -· · · else and I think that- context has -changed drastically. I think the standards for safety and security information now are so high that impacts who goes and who doesn't go • •• ·.: ..... ';' ••••• · Interview· with Jim Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ... ~nterviewec.t ·on March 8, 2017 ____ _ A~gsburg O_ral History Project . . . -· - - --- ···--- .. .. ·.-.:~- .. -·- . -·-- -- - _.. }nte~~wed .1.JY J":_~kame~__Debo~~ -··-··· . - - ..... . .... . -. - ·-·- . . -_~:;:.:.::- Jiiii-Trelstad'." Pcjiter--_ JTP. - · · · :~_:_L:: ·.._·_ Jwokamer.-Deb.ack- JO..-_·_=_. - •• - •••• . . . :1.: . . .. . .... -· -- .. ·- ........ - ■ •••• - -· .... • •• • --- ...:-.. · .~ --~-:.,.·.. --~---:~---•·· ....... i _- ~--·-:··~- --~-- -·-_·:_ :~ .. i" to a lot of places around the world. I think that we role with all those changes and many of our colleagues have been the main presenters again and again at different conferences and so on talking about these issue mean. I believe we have people who do the best at that. In monitoring lots of different levels of things that are going on in the countries in which we operate and elsewhere. That comes from a philosophy that begins with engagement where we have contact with people across different social sectors. So we tend to know a lot about what is going on and how to navigate that in different settings. During those years there was a tremendous amount of people going on the short term trips that were community based trips in churches and independent organizations and journalist. People were going and wanting to get the information which is still very much a part of the short trips that the center does. There is just a lot of both universities as well as other groups that want to get to different regions in which we are located and focus on different issues from the environment, environmental sustainability, cross border environmental issues those have become big. We had a briding groups from Minnesota that go Nicaragua and the Central America to study birds that migrate there during the winter. They're using the birds as the lense to focus on our connection to the region, environment - • ••••••••••• ..:·:·.--~~---_·_·-_ -.- . ~-: -~ :~ ._ ._ _ - - - l:gt~iew with Jim Trelstad ~-,Perter: Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn - -- - Interviewed on .March 8,. 2017 .. .. . -- . . A~gsburg Oral History_~roject . - -· -·- . . --- .. . . ·- ··-· . . -· •. ··-. -· Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock ·- ....... - _.. ~ ~ . Jim"Trelstad-:-.Porter::. .iTP :. ·::. _-____-_ .... -__ _._:_ ----~:: . :. :.:· .....-.- ·:·.-~·:.::.~.:.--J.woJ:(~m~ Pe1J.9~~".' IQ·_· .. -__-_-__ :··:: ___:·_ ~- ....-~ :··- __-_-_ -_ :. . ·_:_:_: _ ·_-~ -_ ---___--__ : :. . . .. . . .•. -- . ·- <_-__:_.-_·: _ .:---:.-: .:_ ::: _-.-_:_ .. : _·:: .-.-. ~. .. ·- . ..... --- ...... . . . . . . -· ..... . .. -·• ... ·- ...... •··- --· ··-··· ..... -·· . . : . - .-. : . . . .. . .:- .- help, all those kids of things. We have a professor at Augsburg right now, John Zobitz, from the Math department who led a short term trip to Nicaragua site a few years ago called Calculus in Nicaragua. Out of that came an ongoing project where they monitor satellite imagery and readings to detect moisture levels that are impacting particular coffee cooperatives in Nicaragua. So they are providing that data to the coffee cooperatives. These are the kinds of things that the center and Augsburg have been connect to for so many years, I think many times we lose track of what's right in front of us. The people who have seen perhaps with the clearest eyes the value that the sites that are outside of Minneapolis have had to Augsburg College are people not connected to the college itself but people who have gone and experienced and taken full advantage of what it is we do at those sites. Then they come back to the college at one point or another and said "Do you guys realize what you have?" I think that has been my experience for many years over many years. That is one of the reason why Augsburg is known in other countries and around the U.S. is specially because of the work of the Center for Global Education within the college's-history~- - - - - - ':" . .·._ ~.. ·. -. -.•. ·. ..: .. Interview with Jint Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn - --------~- -_-~ _ :_: _-_----- -----_---- - -1n~~rvie~~d_on March -s,_2017 _-Augsburg Oral History Proj~ct__ - ·-- . -·· ·- . ... . ... . -- -- . - ~~te~~~~~ by_ J~o~a-~er D~~~c~ _ ___ _ - ·- .. . ... --· - . .. - - .. . ....... - -· . ·•- .. .:·:-:- Jim Trelstad~ Porler---JTP-: -- ~ ..::.: ~:-~.-:_.-.:~ - _: -~ -~-:.::. ___ -.. -.. · ...... ---~ - ---_·::-.;-:: ~---- .: --~::-.-.:. ·: -:.;.:·~----- :-... :_:_ :·:. :_·:_:_=,-_:·::._ - , · _- __ -_:_ Jwokamer-Debock':".-.JD.- -::.-:"-- · -·_- -~------ _-~--•------~ _--::-_: _- _:___--: - :_-::__:-_ -_ -. _- - :- __-_-_ . ·-.--• -_- -~:---.-.: ... -_::··_· - .- _- -__ ·:-= 21.43 JD: - :-- -_ · ·-·· - . ··•·~ . ....... .. . : __ :_-.-::·. __ ::_ y,-_-··::---_: __-;:_-_- What growth have you seen from the time you started until now because you talked about efforts, professors having short term trips. What programs have you seen grow and what have you seen fall back? 22.26 JTP: I would say earlier on we had a lot political science majors, women's studies majors, gender studies major, indicpilnary studies major. Spanish studies so we had a whole conglomerate and our courses, in order to offer programs like we offer and get student from other universities to go, you have to get course that are developed that are designed to meet perhaps ge-ed requirements for lots of Universities. So the course might be somewhat general but one student might get credit for sociology for a course while another student might get political science credit at their home university. These are interdisciplinary courses by design so you actually have the flexibility to get what your professors want you to get at your home university out of it by how -you do your own research- project and so on. So there are designed in that way. I think in terms of just saying how it has grown and expanded I would say we · -·)l•a1iew with J·im Trelstad -- Porter.-"-···'•·-··, Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interviewed on March 8-,. 2017 · -- . .. ·-·· -----. - . ~l!gs~~_rg Or~l History P~~j~ct_ . . Interviewed by Jwokainer . Debock .. . . · ·_·: ... :.-... ~ ·.: .. ~- 'illtii :tr.elstad;:i>orter~-~ .ITP.'. _~--.-=:. ~; ___ --__ -____ Jwq~~er P~l?.oc~-.m . . . -- . - - ..---. --- ·--- -· -. . ·--- . - . . ! • . ,:·• • .. . . =.. • • -····.. .. -·-. - - ....... ..:..- ....... ,. ..•... ,••. -·· .: _;_·-.:~ .. .:. --~-. . ~- of faculty around the country and including the programs that we run that it would require a whole separate interview. We have focused on cross borders issues, immigration, for years we focus on it's impact on communities in Mexico and elsewhere.What it means here and around the world. We focused on the environment. The center has always focused on big questions facing humanity. For many years the tagline was a quote that was attributed to I believe an Austrian women that was " If you come to help us then home but if you come to see how our struggle is bound up in yours than come walk with us." So the idea of not doing these trips for voyeurism, for helping, for charity but simply to understand, to get to know each other and get to know each other and problem solve together believing that somehow it's important for interconnected world, That's sort of been the evolving ethos for Augsburg for many years. Now you can't find any problem that is differences and similarities working at maximum to be able to figure out how we -· · · can-come up with a solution~ That's what the center's work has done for Augsburg. I started to switch over in the 1998 to working with international students, I came up •• :: ~-:.·-~---- have worked to design so many different types of course for so many different types facing the world where we don't need everybody's eyes on it and all of our cultural • ■ • .•·:• .. -:.-- -· ' ....... • · ·· ·., · .........'. _ ---~--;·:~::-i":··•"> Inferview with Jim Trelstad - Porter .... ·- •·:.:·:··. - : · · · .... •;=a"" Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn · Interviewed on Marc~---~,. 2017 ·. ... - . Augs~urg- Oral .H.~story Proj~ct . ... .. ...... . :_--:::·H,..:~. ---~ -~:=·~-· -Jim-Trelstad- PorteF ~JTP": _- .:·:. - ~. '• ---~:- _- .· •.· . ._--_.- ·. ·.' . . . .::~.•: ': ·: .:"" ...... _; =-~--. .. . -·-. ... ---······-- -- - -·. . · :· ..... 4 -·· Iwokamer.Debock-·ID: ···.:.- _. ·: ...... ·-··· . . -- • . ..: . • ·-. ·- .. - •• ~- .. · :• • • • :: ~--- phones, computers and in an office, This is after working with students for years and being constantly with the students which was intensive more like the River semester which is offered here. That was pretty much the way our work, we were like the River semester all year long being very connected to people in close proximity and all kinds of setting and spending a lot of time to dig deep into issues. Coming to campus was very much an isolating experience for me for a couple of years because I was mostly focused on administrative work then I had an opportunity to assist with a situation. One of the vice presidents asked if I could sort out a situation which I did. After they said, "You know we need somebody to take this over. Would you be interested?" I thought this is not teaching but I would love to have the connection with students again this would be a good shift for me and I had no idea I would do this for this long. That led me to just being an international That was wonderful and all the students who came to Augsburg helped raise my kids. We just had so many good ·connections·. I ·worked more and more on understanding intercultural development which means navigating cultural ■ ... , ~-·· & - ~- --··· "--·- .. ·:·· . ·.. .:· .. here for a couple of years did administrative work that kept me mostly either on the student advisor for many years in the office called International student advising. .. . . . . . . . . . ·-... -: ....... --- ; . Inter-view -witli Jim Trelstad ;. Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ---- -Interviewed on March 8-, 201!7 · ...... - --- ·-· . . - -·- -··· . -··· A'!gsburg Oral_ History_ _Pr~ject Interviewed-byJwokam-er-I>eliock ... . - ~--:.. -... ·>- .....:Jim Trelstad- Porter. - JTP --..:-.. ..--.. : -• • _,._. • ._. .• ':: ·: __.;..i_. :_·__ J:wok~roer P.~~9_ck-_-)O- ___ . . ... . . . . - . - ... -·-· - . - . .. . . . . ~- -··· ····•-'••·- ............... , ....... -....... ....... • ■ .. ■ :. • ... • •• ~ .. • ~ ••• ······ .... ·-·-···· . . -··•·····'•"••-·-· .. •··•·········"····. ···- . ~ - - .... .:. - .. - -- ~■ •••• differences and commonality, what that means, how to challenge students. Sometimes people just think that international students comes and just magically know this stuff and I kept saying no they don't just like I don't when I go somewhere else. First we need to get to know each other than we need to know how to present the challenge. I think we have been working on that intentionally more than most other institutions for a long time. We all have work to do to develop our intercultural capacity and skills. That has been great for me and I think the students for many years. I think Augsburg has done a good job of really paying attention to international students and there are many ways that we need to grow fast as an institution and that didn't always happen. We also -on the international recruitment, really it has only been about 5 years that we have had a dedicated budget and a more comprehensive plan, there was some good recruitment work before that but really no consistent funding or coordinated plan and I was not directing any of that. So about 5 years ago I accepted the challenge of working to design a comprehensive international enrollment plan and tried to set up a model for both recruiting consistent with the values of who Augsburg is but also what it means to retain the students. I think we had always had better handle on retaining and what we need to -··· . . · .:::;. _.,.- .:~:.~:.-::-::-.---""'-----'lntetview with Jim•Ttelstad-- Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn - Intei:-viewed cm _Ma~ch ~,-~Ol?. ·_: Augsburg Oral History ~roject __ __ . .. _I~_te~_i_ewed by J~_ok~~~rpe~~~-k __ _ . ---- . .. - -·--. "-' ;,,_<·-·. .. .. ·-··. - ~_:· :·_: - Jim-Trelstad~ Porter ~ JTP. . -- .-- - - -----· -- ·--· - --· . ·---- ---·-· 7 - - . - -· - - . ·... -· ... .. - -- . -. .... ... - ... - . . •. - - -· - . -.. - . ·=.-:.:.~.~-: Jwokamer-Debock-..JD.· ·:..... _·_: . :... - •• -- -•• - ••• ••• • • • - -- • --- •••• -- •·•• • •• - •• • • • ••• •• a I • • ••• ••• -- ■ •• :_-. •••• - •••• :· •• -~ •• - . . •• • ._ •••. '• --· : .· do even though we had our challenges like any institution but I think we have a better sense of what the student really are facing and needing. That's not a surprise to us, we know institutions who have ran out and got a bunch of students to come but didn't know what to do with them but we've never been in that case because we deal with a far diverse student body both domestic and international. I think we understand the intersectionality that we're engaging and it's not a surprise to us. We expect it and have some ideas on how to engage it and also how to engage students no matter where they are coming from about how to develop their intercultural skills. Also understanding the benefits both for personal as well as career development, If you're going to be a teacher, you better learn intercultural skills, if you're going to be a scientist, if you're going to be the one who delivers the paper you better learn intercultural skills because you 're probably delivering to a global audience and you don't want to make half of the room angry and not even know what you did. These are things that are well known within folks who are connected to more larger groups of people from a various cultural groups who have been doing their-down work. It is sort of given even in business today because it will hurt or cost you money if you 're not consciousness of that fact that you 're going to have the ••• : .. ••• . ·. •• : •• 0 • - •• --•:.· •• • • 'I,., :·· ·.. - ==- ·- -~... -·-i!-.- .. ·... Interview with Jim·--Trelstad··- Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interviewed on March 8; 2017 . . . . . A1~gsburg Oral ~lis~~ry ~roject Jwokamer ·»ebock . -Interviewed - . -- - .... ··- by . : ·. -~ :__.·_•:.·... : Tuii Treistad~.:i>orter= _jtp· .-. : . : _· _____ -·_·: __=: .. : ~ :-~ : .·: ~: .. ::>:·..-. :_ -~: .... ... ;~·:.·.·.:::· ·.:.~ ,. -...· _J_wq~a:qie:r__D~b_Q~_fc-:Jit · ·.·:· .... _.. ... . :·_ . ·.- -_- ~ -.... . . . ··• .. . . - ·- . . ... . ... ~ . - ..... . .. .. . .. . .. . . . .. _, ~ -' . - . ·- ..,. ·- . same impact on all groups. You need to understand how messages are filtered across different groups and what that means. But again my focus has always been not on how I can sell more com flakes to another market but rather how is it that through understanding each other better we can better accomplish the things we want as human beings. I think there is tremendous benefits to that. That's what I think the work has been moving for. We still have work to do in the area of international recruitment. Last year when our recruiter got a job at the University of Denver I suggested that we actually raise the level of that position to the director of international recruitment for multiple reasons, one being that I think we need to keep professionalizing the level of everything that we're doing in this area. We had no idea what type of political situation we would be in terms of challenges and that's everything from the current and persistent dropping global oil which actually has impacted a number of countries and regions including Norway where we actually had recruitment connection and things going on. That makes it more difficult to study. We have had the collapse of the Saudi Scholarship Program which also was · .. -another- area ·student were-able to come and study. So-most universities had a few students from Saudi Arabia as well and that scholarship than allowed us to look for .. . .. ··. -· •:.· _.:-,- · ·: lit·tl'!r-view with Jim Trelstad .:.· Porter • ··, ... ;;:, .-·,~··;..a . • .-- ....·-;-:.: ",io: ._..:: Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interv~ewe~ on .March 8, 2017 Au.g~burg Qral n,story .Project . . . ··. ·- ·. .. - ······· -Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock ••• •• • • • • --- •• •• - ■ • -- •• ■ • - - •• -- • • •• • • •· - • • -··· ·- • - • • • • . :-... ~--· . .:·:·:~ .Jim.Trelstad~Perl~r-.:Jff.~.: :...... ~·. :· .... · .:. -_ .~: :·· .. ·:~: .. . ..... . .. ... • • • ■ ■ - . • • .. . - - • . - •••••• ~ . . . . .. .~.··;··..-·:.:·_...;,.:::._-::··.::.~.Jwo.kamerDebock-ID:·:.-·.. ·:·_···. .-::::.:·.-·. ·. . · .-._·............. .:·: ·...:·. ·.-:·:. ·.·~. .. ···· . . - ----- - • -- - - -- --- -·.:· ...... :········.:-···· -- ----- .. .. • -··· - • •• ••• - - - . •• - ·-- .. - .. ·.. : . : . . . .. ,_: : ···-··. • ■ • --- -... . . .. ~.: - : • . • :. •• • .. .. --~ - ·• ; • • . ·. . ~ ---~ . . - ..·- -•.i. •· . .. ...... ···- ■ • .. students in other regions who were also dealing with currency that weren't so strong in order to open up space to get more from other regions. Currently we face a very challenging global situation, I realize this interview is for historical records but we have the recent example of the Indians who were killed in the state of I believe Kansas that is having repercussions all over India in terms perception about rather or not this is a place people want to come. It hard to find somebody around here who hasn't tried to go or gone to Mexico for some sunny purpose of vacation or something. If we think that we can disconnect trips to the beach from what is occurring in the rhetoric within the country were kidding ourselves. That's impacting definitely people who want to study not just in Mexico but throughout Latin America, Europe, African continent, you name it. I mean we are in a situation right now where we don't know what the impact will be but we are certainly right in the middle of that conversation. Augsburg's commitments, values, history I think continues to speak and actually gives us a strong voice within that conversation to keep standing for what we always stood for, to keep connecting the way we always connected or finding a way to connect. That l think is ·something unique that Augsburg has to keep offering as an institution because there are ways we have done ··•·.• ... ~ _. :::_-----:=:~ ..... - ••'!."'! .........~ .• =-~.. -=-- Interview with Jim Trelstad··- Porter·--Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interviewed. on-· March 8,. 2017 .... .. ···- -· ........ --····· ···--· . -·····. . . ·! Au_gsb~rg O~~• ~istory Project inierviewed by Jwokamer Debock . ." :.. ·: ...:-~:-... -::·~.Jim Trelsmd.:.·Portei.~ JTP· · -_ .. :. ::_· :_: -. :_· :: :~ _: :_ · · . .~)wqka~er D_~ppc~;- JP··_ :_:.-: . ·: - ·_... ··- .. - - . - _;__. . __ .. :·: ~- ···-- - - -- ----. __ _;_:-i .. ... :~~ " I, .-... · I, a I, I, ■ ■ I, • a-.- • . I I • ■ ._ - •• I, ■ . • ■ 6 - • • . - •• •• • • L ··--· --- -- - ··- . -··-·. --····-. ·----·- -·· - .. --- and do things that I think are more consistent and get to the questions that need to be asked and perhaps dance closer to some of the answers that many other institutions don't. JD: You talked about how recruitment has not always been strong for Augsburg. Can you explain how that has changed over the years? 35.44 . - ... - • • - • • ■• - - • I,,■■ .. -· .... -- - 35.24 • - • . I, I, I, •· JTP: Well I think without having enough resources dedicated to really mapping out a strategy Augsburg ended up having students come here for lots of different reasons but there wasn't perhaps a way to create visuals of exactly what patterns there were within that recruitment. There were things like "Hey, we had three siblings from the same family over eight years" that might happen but a lot of the student stories would be perhaps more accidental in terms of how students ended up here then a result of an intentional coordinated effort on Augsburg 's behalf in terms of the international recruitment. I think that-that is changing and is a big part of what the shift has been continuing to professionalising the way that Augsburg is interacting ··----------. Interview ·with- Jim- Trelstad - Porter· Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn · - Interyi~wed·on_Ma.~ch ~' 2017-- Augs~urg ()~a, _History rroj~ct ·-- - •• ■ ------··· • .. ·-- ·-·- ••• - _____I~te~~'!ed .~Y J~_~ka~e_r . Debo~_k ... _ : · .:. ~~ .. :..:.: ··:~:_·_:::_~ Jirii:-Trelstad- Porter-.- -JTP - . . .. --~,- . ;_.:'. ':. :·- . ;__,__ ~... ·. _Jwokamer Debock""'..ID. . ·....... · ·:·· ~-- ~. .. •••-•. ••• -..:..,..';T. • " . .;. • •:. • • •• -:. . .. . .. -·. ... :.. .. and building connections and relationship in different areas of the world and being more intentional about tracking data. I think a lot of institutions 10 to 15 years ago did not have really good data regarding much of this. I think Augsburg has upped it's game but I think it's fairly recent. One example would be even as we develop alumni networks, what Augsburg looked like 10, 15, 20 years ago as a campus, who was here, what families look like, what their understanding of alumni connection would be when they graduate is very different from the current population. I think that it is inevitable that we'll need to continue to develop what some people will call affinity groups connections because there has to be lot of entry point into an institution once you graduate. What do you want to be with in a relationship with the student once they graduate. It used to be a consistent pattern of people largely from the similar demographic, we would come back for homecoming, we might watch the football game, we would gather with our classmates, we might get certain things from the college in the mail, sometimes just updates from the news magazine but other times a request for donation and here is what we're doing now. ·· · We still·do a lot of those things·hut if-you graduate·from the 1960s or late 1970s and · your primary connection to Augsburg was the Black Student, which it was .. • I - • .--:--~ : -- '1:" ... -.-.::,,;.,...-.. ,. ..:-.:. .. .. --- Interview with Jim Trelst-ad --- Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn -----Interviewed on March 8;·2017 - - - - - ....... ... .. . . . • - ••• --·- -- ••••• ··- ...... -- • - - - •• • ••• • •• • - ••• .- - - .. - -·- - ■ • - ••• - - - - .. - .... ••••• - - ■ •• • - - • •• - - • •• ·- - • • • - - • - • ■ • • • .. • • • • • ■ • • ·- - --- . •-·· ........... • - ... ....... - •••••• - - - • •• . - • ·- •. • • • ~ • • - - .i, . . . . . .. . • - - - ~ • ■ .. . ■■••·•■•■•• I•■ - .: • --~ • • • . . ... .. -- . . . . . . . . . . . . . .'"'. a·• •• --- .. - ·-. --- . Jini Trelstad- Porter..:. JTP _:·---~---. -~= ·_ :_·-·:_·- . ·-·-··-·- - - . - - -· .. - . Aug~burg Oral History ~rojec~_ Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock • • •• ; • ., - • -•. - •• •: ~ ••• ..:. ·•• ·;· ........ . originally called before it became Pan Afrikan Student Union, what is your connection acknowledge in any of our alumni efforts, was there any sense that your primary connection was through the International Student Organization, that might be one of the conversation to have as an alumni is how do I stay connected with those folks. How do I stay connected to the experience of international students or whomever and not just limiting it to specific offices or organizations but it simply is being consciousness of different affinity groups and how those could be the main reasons someone wants to stay connected to an organization. As long as that lifeline is maintained there is greater openness to other types of conversations like "Hey, I know this has been something that has always been important to you. Would you want to know about what it is we're doing today? I think you might be interested in this." Than your willingness to check it out might be greater and maybe you want to get involved now with somethings now with Augsburg that you were never interested in and you thought Augsburg capable of when you were a student here. So I think we have growth to do in that area and I think I see signs that we are ··· growing in that-area-but I know I have felt that my-own capacity has been limited in terms of all the possibility I see about how might really continue to energize the •.I••:•••• ■... : • : • ~ - - •• --:. - • •• ·-. ': ;. • • .. - - ••• J : • J •••.••I ·~·.: :~- Interview-·with J-im Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Interviewed· on l\~~ar~h ·~?. 2~17 · _Augsburg Oral History Project ·--- . ---· - -· ---·· - - ....... -Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock ... -·· - ... .. ··-. . - .... ·····- ~=:. = ==...:.:...:~:~--~- .= =. -~- __ ::~· ..... ... ···----· . .. ·-··- ···----·. . --··-· .... -- -···· - ·--· - .......... - Jwokamer.Debock-=-.:JD ·____ · . • -· ... ... -- • -·--·--. .. .. -····--· • • • . --· . ·- - . - -- . -. - .. . -. -··-···---.. . - ...... ·- . . .. . -. -· ... --· - - . -·- ...·- ---·· :_. -··: - .. ··---· •.-· ···---··· - - ......... - -·-···· ... -···· ................. ··- --··· . . -· .. -····. ..... . . ... . - - - •••••••••• - • _,:-•:::."···: --·. . ---- . •• - -· --· • . ............ ··- •• • • -··-- .: ..... -· . -····. ··- .. •• - • •• - •• • -- . . . - . • •• - • •• • • • • --~ . . . . . . . . • ........ - - - • • • . . . • • . • • • • . .:.. - .... . . : •.•••• - • :. : -:.·· 1· • :· • ·- • •• : ,; • -. .• - • • • - •,1 -- . - work we have done you know around the globe and that includes with our students. We have both anecdotal and concrete evidence of Augsburg graduates who are very much open and interested in being connected and involved. Most recently our Vice President of Enrollment went on a recruitment related trip to India and I connected him to an one of our alumni from 18 years ago and that particular alumni couldn't wait to connect with Augsburg. Another person was randomly in a bookstore in one of the major cities in Pakistan and the owner of the bookstore came up and said "Augsburg College, I graduated from there." My wife's orthodontists growing up was a 1970s graduate of Augsburg from India. I was in Norway in a upper level meeting with ministers of this and that and one of the Associate Ministers of Education and Research for the Norwegian government steps forward to asks if a couple of professors were still at Augsburg because he was a 1980s graduate. These are things that I don't think we necessarily paid enough attention to. There is a principal called the accurate differentiation which really is to bond on the things that we really do have in common together but also to accurately differentiate when · ·perhaps some of the things we were drawn to or did are different and to be able to make sure that we see those things are different and that not only ok but it's good. I - - ._ .. • ~--··:- - • - - •• - • • - • •• lnterv-iew with Jim Trelstad - Porter. . . Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ·- - ..Interviewed on March 8, 2017 . . . .. ···-·.. -· ·-. . ........ . . : :·-.~_.:·:_·· ...~.~:·.•/..!.;::.;, ~_,······· .. ·-·· .. A~gsburg qr~l H~st~_ry Pr«,.j_ect . ·-· -· ...... . -· -·. ·-· .. ···--· ·-·· . -···- --··· --· Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock . .. . . . . - .. . . .. . . --· - ··- . ·- .. . - .... ■ ::_ .·--.-~·.: .... ~·::.~--~ Jim.±relstaci.:._p()rfer:: JTP:.. -~ _--_:_·::·_ -·_·: . ·_ ..... ··- .... . .. ... .•... ·-·· ·-···-· • • • ·-·· - ··-····-·· ·- .. ~ . . ·•. • . ■ ..... .. . -·-· . . ••••••• -- - • .. ' •·■ ...... -·- - • . . ·... ~ ··- :: . ··.. .. confident that Augsburg has the capacity to up our game in those areas. JD: 42.35 JTP: . .;; think that there are way which we could do that better moving forward. I'm 42.20 - ~ --·- • ·-·- •• ■ Can you explain why you have stayed around Augsburg for 25 years. That's a great question and I sure hope I'm not perceived as dead weight at this point. I think I have grown up at Augsburg, I raised my kids at Augsburg and the biggest reason that I have stayed connected is a believe in the place, the mission of Augsburg. I ~on't go around for utopia in other places, I don't think it exists, I think Augsburg has been a place where I don't feel I have to wear a masks. I can show up and be who I am. Augsburg has been more open to the most difficult conversations than almost any other place that I have been. I·have had a lot of time ···to ·look at things outside· of here, have different opportunities come my way but at the end of the day I really have a difficult time because I have to show up as me - . ··.. - .. Interview with- Jim Trelstad --- Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn · ---_-----------~----~-~------- ·-------- ----- - Interviewed on March~, 2017 ·_·_ · _· __ - ·-· . .. . . ... . . .. . . . . ... . .•... ...... ~.-;.. .-·:··-:-·-··· . ·..... , .. .· . ·--.- . . . . .. ~ ~ugs'1urg_Oral H;istory :t;»roj~~t _ - ·-. - . .. . . . . ... .. . . . .. .. Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock . .. . ... . .. . ·- . . - . . . .... . . ... -- -. . - . . . --:·~~-::.:~... .::·:·:~-- Jim Ti--elsfad:.:._porler--~ J'.fp:: ·.:.:.: .: ... :~ .:-·--- _-_- -~- :···-i : : · .. .. .. . .. .. . . -·. -:.~:;_.,·..:·::.;=·-...:.:~:-_:_-_:::...::::Jwokamer Debock-.·JD. ·:::··· _· ·_ -_-_: :. :: _- · . :. .· . :.: ·:: _:_·_ :· _ -___ -_- _:_ .:~ .- .. __ ::: ·. .-.- ,:·_- ·.-::. :.·. _._. _ . :_ :....~: -_ · --.::_} . ··--·- ········---·--·· .•.. ... ···- - . .. .. -- . - --··-· . . . . .. ... .. - -. _________ -.-;.:. :-.-~. _-_·-.-: . .:.:--,:.::::.:: ·•:. --~-... . - . .. .. - . .. . . . . -· -- _._ ·. - .. : ...·-· . . ... -..... ·- - . . . . ... . .. .: :-··-:: ~ .. . -=:. .. ._. ~ ~ :- :.-:-- . -·- where I am. Coming from the teaching environment in the Mexico programs where were talking openly all the time about racism, sexism, homophobia, classism all these sorts of shifting pieces that always are present no matter what issues we're trying to address and to continue to be in an environment where that is always apart of the conversation, where we are still curious, trying to learn, trying to grow ourselves and at the same time provide an environment where others are also trying to grow as well that's a tall order because from that to campus here. There were a number of big adjustment for me, where I wasn't sure how the fit would be this is different place but ultimately I found that the people here were doing some much of the same thing and have been for a long time. We have always been housed with Multicultural Student Services since my time here and I think that the colleagues in our suite have profoundly shaped me and have been my go to people for consulting a different things that I face. I think we've provided that for a lot of years for one another and that's been a really important part of this time here at Augsburg for me. At many school international and domestic multicultural get separated and I think at · Augsburg··both by choice·and- by-accident because it was not by really people's · choice that people would be housed in the same building which no longer exist over •·· . .. . ·-Interview with J-im Trelstad - Porter '-,-..,.--,:=-,:.:-:~:c•---:;;.;,:••,,,,-;:_;·,_.: it~:_;·••,;· Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn - -- ··Interviewed on March 8, 2017 ... . -·-· -·· .. A~gsburg_ Oral ~is_tory Project .- Interviewed by Jwokanier Debock Jim Trelstad-. ·Porter·- JTP ·. ·· -- .-::. ..... :-:. .-- ... . . - ~ ~ ~ .·.lwo~a.iiier. D~b~ck-_ JP .··. ~ . .: ., ._ - .. ·----- ... . . . ... •• - - ...... ····•····· - • ··- ----- - -· - • ·- -■--. -- • -- -· - · - · · · • ... ······-··----■·•·,. - ·: --~. •·· ~--- . ::.:··-~---:-~:=~-- •• ■ • ·--~:::.·:i~---·7·;~i•::_·.--~: - :-·:··i··- .---~--. . . . - ..... -: .... ··- :- ·:-. . --~--- . .. .·.... . . .:. -- ·:.:·: ·:.: :· ...:-.- -· ._. -. :.:. . - ;_ -:·. -== . :.:. :-· there. I think the result of being together in the same space allowed for people to have the kinds of conversations that are furthered our thinking about global intersectionality. It's all the pieces of who we are right now doesn't matter ifl transported from India, North Minneapolis or Western Wisconsin but that we show up with all the different facets of who we are and it's always in the room. I think that that understanding of the shifting that happens when people are together is the deepest level of intercultural understanding. I think that our consciousness of that just continued to grow over the years that we didn't speak the discourse of traditional international education which has many times set itself apart is something extra special. Usually it better funded so it's been sort of set apart. Again domestic being set apart is not engaging issues that have been important to international education. In Mexico we were constantly bridging those two areas in the early 1990s and some of the research on bridging multicultural/ international was coming out. We worked particularly on this with a professor who is self identified as Chicana from South California who kept coming back working, taking groups to us and - · really-digging into this and saying-"Why ·are we not-consciousnessly in dialogue and what are the disconnects?" In a sense deconstructing what some of these reasons ................ . ■ •• - -<:·----interview with Jim Trelstad -· Porter -~!-:,-,;:.,,.-...,.. . ~.,,. ..:·' ..;:'- . ·:.: .. Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn - Interviewe~__ on_ ~a~ch ~;-2017- _ __ Augs~!)_rg O_ral Htstory_fr~ject_ ------- -· .. . . _~~tervi_e~ed ~.Y.. -~"'~k~~~_r}>eb~C.~ . . .. .. . . - .. . . .. . . . .. . . .. . -·-·:_· .. ~.:~.:- ..:·.:·:_~- Jim~Trelstad~ Poiter- JTP-: - . ·:.·:· . --·. . .. ...... .. - . •• .. :' ;_,,_,_, .i:.. ;_; -~--. __ . _Jwokamer Debock- JD.: .. ___ · ... ---~ ... _ -- . .- • -· •• - - .... ••• -· •• - . 'I, . .:. . .. - I • • • • • • . I . . . ,· ... ■ .- ... -·•"- ·:"" . ., • .... .••·:•·. -.• • ••• . : . ......... . . . .. . . ··• - . - •• ':': --·- .- : ~ - . ·: were that offices weren't talking, that people weren't making obvious connections that do do exist. Fast forward to 2017 and we have students on this campus that are from all over, who have dual citizenship, tri citizenship, permanent resident in this country, this and that. It's coming out of their mouths before you even say what the issues is. So many of our students take it as a given that the world is that connected and this is the way it is. Is not that you can isolate it within a mission state boundary, it has been forever bigger than that. Augsburg for me is a place where I feel that I am able to be who I am. I'm able to be challenged constantly, I love the people I work with, I love the students. Everytime I look elsewhere I haven't found a better fit for me while I've been raising my kids. 49.09 JD: You 're not only the Director for International Scholar and Student Services but you also do work around campus. Can you tell us a little more about what you do around campus? 49.23 JTP: - ·. ·.... ■ ••• l,'I, You mean like take out the garbage? I do that whenever possible. I do - . • _·.· ;.· .... • • - ... • •· • • a-. . :---······:·•-:.·-_.:·: -.ii= ....... _ ... , • .:... •• -··- --- - . ·- .. -· Interview witb:Jim·Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn - ·----Interviewed on-March 8,-2017 ·A~gsburg Oral History ~roject -.. --·-·1nie:rviewed--by··Jwokitinei-··»e·bock- . - . -- . --- . - ··--· ... . - Jim Trelstad~.Porter. =-.itP · _ ~-_:.-· ..·.... :. Jwpkamer :Oeboc~'." Jit- .:. :_ -:. ·-. ---. . - ·-·-· . ···--·-· ·-·- . .__-_-· -. _-_- ·· ·.....:: . :. .. ---··--- ................ - - .. - ... -. . . ..... ... ---■----- ...... - • : . - ·- ··- -- -·· ·----~----_·.-.::··-··. ···:··. . . - .. 00 ········~---.:·· •,•:~ .:. ~ .:.:. ,-:. :----1"·~· ·;;·. -:-··· . .-···= -- : ..........._. ..~-- ·=~ •. .•.u----,.,-.. -.:-~~-:-c,.?. ,,,·:·..•.:>2'-.-..,c -- .-.. ·-··. • • • : -~~- - - • • ···.··.·~:~-:··; ••• •:··_~--~- ~ ... 0 •• ~. • • ~ • • . ■ H -~ whatever water needs caring. Actually when we worked in Mexico and the garbage truck would come by and the bell would start dinging all of us would run up to the garbage cans and make sure that the we got them up the street. We did that for years. Most of what I have done has been connected to global education aspects of the campus. I work with visiting professors, we have one currently from Japan and another one from China. I work with exchange students and we issue all those forms so again those are all things related to what a typical International Student and Scholar Services office would do. I am a qualified administrator of the Intercultural Development Inventory and that is work that we are consciously doing around the campus with different pockets of students, faculty and staff. The goal is to increase the intercultural confidence level of any and all believing that developing one's capacity to navigate cultural difference and commonality more of the time allows us to actively engage complex intercultural issues. Therefore has more choice and potentially to contribute towards solutions to challenges and to meet our own intercultural goals which can vary. If you are a professor, you want to be an effective develop your intercultural capacity. You will be most successful with people like . • .. ■ •0 ~-- ;: ··- · ·- professor end of story and you can't- be as- effective- as a professor if you don't . -·· ....... . .:·. •• • • • · . ;___ -..·. · •. . :·.-··_· ··-. ~- · _.. _.;;,Interview with Jim Trelstad ~ Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn I~terviewed o~· Marc~· ,;·:~9J 7-· _- ····~ugsbu~g Qral History Project -. -· -■ - - ••••• ■■- ··-- - • J"" • --· --· ......... .. . . ··-· . . ... ·- - • - - -- - - •• - . . --- •.. -. - ·- - . . ·- - . - •• ... . . . . . . . . . • • • • • • • • • . --··- -- . --.. .. - . ------- . -· ... . .......... ····--·--·····--· ___ ,._. ·•·--····--· . -·--·-····· ····-··· ·--·-· ...- - .-------·-- . ----- • • - -. - - .... - . .. ----••· ....... . .. . . . .. . .:·:·:·_ ·Jim Trelstad:.. Porter--.JTP··· ~- · . - -. . . -··-- ... ···- .. .:.=·_:;·"· =: .=·---...-:__ , __:. ,:_~Jwokamer Deb.ock~·-JD· · .:·,:_.._·· : . ........ . . . .... ••• • • • :· ··::·:. :. •· ...... ·- . .. • ••••• •• yourself unless you develop your intercultural capacity. Staff is the same thing, if you are in an accounting office, business office, doesn't matter where you are or a front line person with student groups you have t~ have this capacity to be most effective in one's work. As student I think that cultural self and cultural others understanding doesn't come for free, it doesn't matter who we are, most of our understanding of culture is not in our awareness unless we work to bring it to our awareness as a result of learning cultural contrast and then consciously reflecting on it. The more we reflect on the capacity again I think it's a multiplier for us achieving mitigating its impact and making sure I'm making my decision based on a more accurate assessment of what's occurring rather than overreacting to the cultural difference in the room that I don't know what the heck is going on. So I am a more powerful person, I'm capable of loving more people who are not like myself more effectively. I am more capable of achieving my intercultural goals in terms of · · ·- -· ·· · ·· · ·spending thousands of dollars on an Augsburg education. I'm going to be a better employee, not matter what I do. I'm going to be able to argue more consciously : ,.. ., - .. ----.. - --- . .... . -. ·:. -- -·-····· ... ;-: --- ._._. __ -.·.. ·- -.:-:-..-: cultural differences. I'm going to be more effective in navigating and therefore . ;; . ·- . . . . . .. ■ ·.- .... - our goals across cultural difference. I'm going to be more accurate in recognizing : :. ,:: -~ .. . . .... -· --1-nterview with Jim-Tnlstad -~Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ·-· -- Interviewed on-··March 8, 2017 .... .. .. .. _.. ;;_ .. -:..- ·., ·... -::-.-~~- :.· ... ·· -· -··~-- ·a:-r~f:~. ·;." =-~''.~;2~.:----<--:::·-,_:_:: . .-.::~~-:=:;.-,.:._: . . A'!gsbu~~- Ora~ History Proj~ct Interviewed-by Jwokamer·»ebock • • • -·.. • - • • ■ •• - -- ·:_ .. :: :·: .:·_ ~ ·_:_::_~··· 1im .Tn~lsfad.;.~Port~r::. Jtt ... ·: . : \·:t;':··::~:- Jt-. -~--- -Jwo~~mer_P~Qoql~~ jp __ ·_· • • : •~• ■ ',JI.-· ■ • - • • : ■ --··--····'· • • ■ ■ •• --- :-::::-·.---:: .. ·:·. ·--::-:.:·-:·_ ._ ■ I ·- ...... :: .. --·:::::.:.· .. ___ ..... ·-· -- what my skill sets are and convince employers that I can do this stuff. Whatever it is you want me to do I'm going to be able to do it better because I know these things. Augsburg is committed to social justice, equity, very big weighty terms but those terms look differently depending on how much intercultural work one has done. We need to be able to have conversation where we understand what social justice means to different people at the table because it's not all the same. What equity means to different people and understanding the ways we understand or think we want to see it happen impact us similarly and differently. That comes with doing intercultural work. So I am deeply committed to that process however and whenever it can happen the eye is a tool that we helps target one's development but really is the beginning of the conversation. It's not the intervention, it's the beginning of the conversation how might I grow, how might someone else to grow. That's a piece that I spend a lot of time working on. In terms of other things I do are providing feedback session for other for people who had taken eye to eye, doing presentations at venues for residence life, staffs, sports teams that are going to be going out of the ·-country for a -particular ten day-trip, talking to different pockets of faculty, talking about how this stuff gets into our general education, again that's probably getting :..._.;. ·....:·····-. . . ... --:·:· . ~- ---·=::.,.•·• Intenriew with Jim Trelstad - Porter: Inteniewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Intem.:~~~d~ on ·Ma~c~_ ~~-201_7 · · -~ - · ._ - Aug5-burg _Qral ~~story }:'roject_ . ... . - · · · · - --- ····- --·--· ···-·---- --·····---···--- ..... . Inteniewed by Jwokamer Debock ··-· . .. . . . --. - -·-·- ...... ·-... --· .. . . . . . ... -· . . ... - . :: ·:·~-- -~-~--- · .:· :·:.·· Jim-Tr-elstad..:.·perler.:. JTP·.:· .. ::· . . . ·- .. . . - - . - ······· - ••••••• -· -- . . .. . . ••••• .. -· al ■ . .. .. . .. - - ·-···. -· . - - . . . . . . . . - · - • • • • •·· • • • . . . --·-:.·· ,. ..... . ■ •• -· - ·-· . •• - . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .... -::~:·•.-:-2:~.--·=_:..:.~:- . -... .Jwokamer.Debo.ck~-ID.-.:·.·_· :__·_·: ... :···:·_ :___ ··: ::.:.-...-.··__ _-··:::····· . .·- .--~ . ····:•~-:·.,·,. ~--··: ~ ·:' ·.. :. --~--··: .: .. - . .. ··--- - .... ---·-· . ··-·· . . . . . . . . . . . --· . . .... . .. ... - . --· ---- -·-.. . ····- ... .. .. . ·-•- .. ..-:.--;--. -=~·- - - -- . - .. .. . .... . : . . __ "• ' i I • • . .. outside of my job now but that's just me being squeaky. 55:18 JD: you talked about both international student and people studying elsewhere. Did you see a connection between the two? 55.35 JTP: Yes, between what I've been just talking about? The thing is to, again I started my life at Augsburg in the center, Center for Global Education, now it's Center for Global Education and Experience and that was my first eight years, and then since that time I was in the office of International Programs contacted to the Center for Global Education, and then since 1999 International Student advising and then since 2011 it was ISSSS (International Students and Scholar Services), so not in the center. What I can say is that one of the things about Augsburg that rea11y comes from understanding intersectionality and being able to be simply more effect · at navigating cultural difference and similarity is understanding how relationship · network work. Who knows who. What barriers people from different background . .. · -~ - ·-:- .: -~--- . . ""• .• • •-· •.~- • . ... •• -::_·.·:. :. · ·. :·- ~- _ :.lnter,view with Jim Trelstad ·•··Porter--- ---: Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn · · --·-· Interviewed on- Marcb-·8, 2017-· .. A~gsburg. <;>r~l ~istory Project Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock ·- .. ··-. iihi Trelstad.:. Porter ~ JTP · .. .......... . -· -- - . .. .. •· - ..-- . . ...·- ... ····· .... .,.... ----- - ----. --·- --- --···- ··-···· , " .. -Jwo~am~r De"b.~.c:k-.JJ.f _:-__.<.· .·..• ~ ......:· ... . - -·-:- .. ·····-··· ···-··-:..~- .. -~- ·- --: - - ....:.-:· ·. might face going somewhere that someone else might not face. I think applying that knowledge my colleagues within Augsburg Abroad, have been extremely effective at who goes abroad. Augsburg is a one of the few colleges that the students that have be going abroad have been going on different types of experiences outside of the country.. Even some other experiences that have been within the U.S. but off campus. That group of stude~ts have come to mirror the students that are here which is not the case at other institution put it simply the off campus studies are for folks . who have money. It is not without challenges, there is always challenges but even the efforts to make sure that students are apply to get certain scholarships, Gilman Scholarships, other sorts of scholarships be conscious on again what trips might be more cost effective and how can we pull together your academic objective with options so you have options. There's been just a lot of great work to get feedback from students and also bring good information to students and families. For some students the family conversation is matters and parents will be intimately involved at every step of the way. For other students maybe it's just their choice. There going to make that choice even it· means getting a third job. Just trying to navigate all that and stay connected to what and being clear about the way of the experiences, I mean .- -: .. _ - Interview with Jinr-Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn -------- ·:~----- --- ·-:- · · -------- · ·_Intervi~~ed ~~ Mar~h ~~-·2017 -- -~ Augsburg Oral History Project . ···-··. -· .. ··-- . .. ··- ·- .... -·-- ----- - --· ~~~~~i,~~~d br.__Jw~kamer ~ebo~k _ _ -·· .... _ ~- ·:·:.-~::..:.:· .:-.~·:_· Jim/frelstad".'-Porler--JTF::. __.- ·_ i kamer.·Db 0 :_:_·- __ _-:_ Jwo· 1.-~·:-:::·-_-::-_,::_./ .e ock-·JD :--.: ·_ ... :. .... • - :. •• • • I ■ •• . ·- ... . • • • • • • • . --···· . - --.-· . ----- .. • • ·- ... ...,.: . . . . .: - :· =:.- . .".": - . • • •• - •• • • .1 . . . . - - .. -=-= -- • '. -· .! • ··- • • • • ■ p •.-:.•I.,_.•. -.. -:.. • •• ■ • • .:. loA. : - -- - •• -.- -:.-;::- .,. .......... .:.,,,._ - .- ..····:··-· - :·.:.-."':- .:. . _. -~ . .: : -: . : . --~=--···: -- ·-:. :~.·-: .- -_ --=·--:·-:-:. . •-· :. :·· for us, these are not vacations right? For me personally having taught outside the country and having been involved I'm not a fan, if this is what it is for somebody. I also remember it's different when I'm twenty verse where I am now but I still speak from what motivates me to do this. It is the conscious reflection on these experiences, the opportunities to share and contrast and compare with people from different experiences and the potential goal that can come from that if someone talces that experience in both for professional and personal growth. That's why I do it. I think it could do such lofty things as possibly prevented a war. I know that's not always going to motivate people to go to places but sometimes you never know. I'm not a fan that study abroad or off campus is always beneficial or that it all always positively changes people because research shows that it doesn't. Sometimes what it does is just reinforce prejudice, it does all kinds of different things and so how we go about it and how we set it up does really matter. I like the way Augsburg tries to do it, you can't control someone's experiences but I think we try to start the right conversation and carry them forward both before someone goes, while they are there and also once they get back; ·But again it's hard messy work. . . ~ .. ,::- '4111te.~iew-with Jim Trelstad-Porter~--,-· Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn --- -- ------ --- ··----Interviewed-·on-March 8, 2017 ···... .. -. A~gs!»urg ~ral His~ory Proje~t -·· ··--·- ---···--· ·---- -- ·------- - ···-·- ·Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock i'":• -~- ·-····- . -- - ·-· -.. - --··-.. ----··· .....- ·-- -·- --- -·- ---- ____:_~-..-- ~ • • •• •• • • • • • . . . - . - - -· • • . • • • - .. •• • . - ••• • • • .. •. . ·-· Ho•• 0 •- 0 ••- - -··--·- - -··------ ···------ . . .. --. -·- ·--·. ---- --- -·· -· . ............................... - ····- - -- ... . -- -- ....... _ . :·: Jim Trelstad~:Porter:~ ITP·. _:·. _ _•-:~:.-.-:.::-:.:i,: .:.:_:·-_.: __ - Jw9.Jca:m~ .PebQc1.:c- nL·-.:..:..: - •---• - ••••-••• • -• ····-·.. -•--•• •••-•• • . . . ••••--•• - • • •: • • ••~ • : • • • •• .. . . .. -· : . •.. • . •• - • • • • • • .•• • • -"':""" • • .-4 • ,oa, .. •. .. . . . . -- ... ..... :· ·.. - .. - . - : ......... --- . . .. . . ..... ........ ---•• ••• • ••- •• 0 • •• • -••• - .:.. :~. -:..- .- ':, • •• " • ~ .•· . •• ; •. :· ••• • •• . •• .. • . •• ... -. . -.. ··-·• 60.23 JD: You said you were back at Augsburg in 1998, Can you describe Augsburg? 60.34 JTP: Well I had only been on Augsburg's campus twice because I was up here meeting with all my colleagues from the other countries and the Minneapolis staff so I never knew what it was like. Even when I studied at Augsburg's program in 1988 I came directly from the other campus in South Dakota so I had never know Augsburg and how it was on campus. The physical campus was very different, we had no dome, we had still had quite a few houses that were on campus property so we had offices in those houses. That's a way a lot of campus have been for the last twenty- twenty five years. Campuses all over the place had started to essentially to knock down the house and build big new buildings and all that. Augsburg has been in that process as well. 61..34 JD: Do you think the relationship; between Augsburg and the community has gr-own? Can you describe-the-growth?· • • ·• o I • - • . --~ • ~ ,lriterview mth·•Jim-'Trelstad - Porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn Inte~ewed·~~--~~~h-~~-2.o_rr·-· _· -~-~-~-~-- ·_. ·· ··- --- ·· -·:·. ·_··---~--.: ~-~----~---~~ -_- --·-----···-·-- ···· ~ugsbur:g Ora, ~st~_ry :rroj~ct -_ -· • - . - .. •• • -- • • ■ - -- ._ - . ·· ... .. · ·_· -.Jim~Trelstad.: Porter.: .JTP -_ -: · ;~ •. -· .·· ·--:· -: : ·;;_._. \ . Jwokani..er D.ebo.ck~ JD: .f: .:. ~~ ::,.- :.··-.:. -.. -==---=~~ _._---=-.:..·. ·: -.. -··.. :.. :-.:·.~------- :- -· .•- 61:50 :.. --·-·· ·---- ._ ~ -- -- .. i. ·. .- -· ..... ,. :,. ~ -•·• .. ~ . -. ···--· . - .. .. _ - • . .. .. - - ·- ... .. •·- · · ·· -- ··:·- - ::-··. · ' . • - ·•...... 1 · .,,_. . . . .-.•. . • - .. --... --:-.. .... ·-·- ·-··--·- -- . - -- - ------- • . • I• ---- ·--:-.:.:;:·.--:. -::-- ·-.=.::-.: :: - ·---- ..:...· - . -::-=.-·;:-_ • ·.. -":"'"" -- ·--- - • . · ... ·••• '""':' ·. &. ... ■ ·---.- ':: •-·- ~ :. ... --- - I --- - • . ·. '-:, . . i.• .- - • 1: ------- ·- --· --· - ··-- - ............ - .................. . - . -.-~- • ···•· ~- ·:-·t ·. ... ------- - .. ........ ··-·-----·· -. -- - •-• .i. • . .. . . . ·r·- ··•·.· -:.- ····.•··. -:- .•--:-:.---.- ·· · ,·-=· '!'. . .... •-. .·.;_., .-. .... _ .. •• -·: • .:,_,, ..,.;_· -- .... - -- ···-- . - -- - .. -- .... --=- ·- . - ·-... ..... =- .':' -·-· --: .:..::.~ ,_:...:. ':·-··::·-: . :.-::- ·-:• - .-.._.- ~..::~- _.._..-.- :.-~:::..~.-:-. -.- . ~--.-.-::-.:: . .'::. -.. :.. :. u :··- • •• --~ • .. ·• .-· : .... JTP: I do think that has been the two biggest impacts are simply the transforming of the student body and who is here. That include plenty of students who are from right in the surrounding area. Th~t's had a huge impact it also says here is how Augsburg talks about itself, here is how people right across the street really think about you. We have that feedback loop now in the day to day. It wasn't there as much before. I think we had more a discourse of we're helping the community, we're connecting to the community which I think a lot of campuses do in big urban centers tend to frame themselves in that way. I think Augsburg has become more sophisticated and changed for the better by being conscious of it matters how one builds a relationship with the community on deeper levels. Augsburg was already a lot of things way before the last five, six years that I think we're probably better and more sophisticated that a lot of schools. I think there were still layers of perhaps things we weren't seeing as an institution that can only be seen the deeper the relationship becomes. Also the last ten years of leadership on campus, the President as well as lots of people who are here on campus··have really continued to build on the ethos that Augsburg is not gonna build a wall or strong boundaries with our surrounding -· .•:.!::-:.·~··· .. Interview-;•with· Jim---TFelstad - Porter · Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn -··- · -· lnterviewed on March 8, 2017 A1~gs~u~g Oral Histo~ Proj_~ct .. -·. ·-··-···. - ·------ - -- - .. ·-- .. Interviewed by Jwokamer Debock . . ·······-···- :''-,-,,·,,·:.- ·-· --- -- . ,: 1· -- . --·-- - · -· ··-····-· . . .. --- .... . Jwo.\qJJnei:_Deboqk-.JP- . ·_: ·: ..:- --~---- ---_-_._-·:· _-______ ·_.... .... --·-· . - .·.-.....;. : ... :~.~··.~-. - ··: ·. -~·- i. .. . ····- ..... -. . . . ·--· -· ·-· - . ··- ....... - - --··· . . .=· .- .• -.·~ ·-~ ....:--:· : .•.• ~- ..··.:.; ·;:· ··: ..·:·. -· .... : . . - area. We are going to do exactly the opposite. I think that the for the folks who made the decisions both when the Oren Gateway Center went up and now with the new Hagfors Center to build those building that they actually seek to connect with the community is an architectural choice. When the Oren Gateway Center went up it was an architectural choice, it was constant and exploit that we are not walling off this campus. I think that is probably the biggest statement that Augsburg. Everyday is a new day and it's not usually about the shining things but being constant and athletic sometimes saying your sorry, celebrating the things that are worth celebrating. Over time I think that what builds credibility and I think that to me is Augsburg I love the most. With ability to say "Yeah, we were really missing this ten, fifteen year ago we could not see this. Maybe someone was sitting there saying "you're not seeing this and nobody was paying attention. But the opportunities to have chances to keep doing thing in a different way and holding ourselves accountable to high standards. I think that is something Augsburg has managed to keep doing as imperfect as an place but I some of those decisions and the way they · have been carried out have· kept me enthusiastic about this place. - .... ·-··- .· ···- _-_· ·a:· ·.• ..:.·::. ...:..::-·. ·. • .. .- . - -lnter\ti"ew with Jim Trelstad··;;.--porter Interviewed at 2211 Riverside Ave Minneapolis, Mn ··· ··-·-·Interviewed-on··March"· s-·- ·2017--- · · ·-·-·. .. ... - -·-·-- _. ·. __ Augs~µ~g_Oral Hist_ory_Pr~ject _ . . ··- • ---- . -· ----- --------- - ••• :. ·-· - .. _ .- - -- - . . . ._ ••• . : • - . - ' . •••• - - - • •• -.-- ~ -~ : -- .·. ... :Jim-T-rel_stad=--Pori~r- - JTp·: -: _-_: .:_.·...:-. :·:-· -:.: -: · .:·: ~ - :. :· :-:_· · ·: . .. . . -. . ·- --- . . - . .. . ... - .. .. . . . . .. . . . - -- - .. 0 • :_: - ••• .. . - ... ·.--·- - : ·:·.-·-.· - ..:. ·-:--..::::- ---- - .:-:-- - ··- --=-· :.:. ..:.·.~···::. . ;··:·-· .··- ::·-~ --=--·::-::..:.. :' --=--=-- --::. -:·.:-:__ - ···: .. ·.-- --·-.-.-. ··:··. . ·;2 - ~-~- ;-: ::.:· ~- . . - ·· • • ..--:·. .:·::. - ... ·- ; ·.·' : -:,:. ••• ... _ . . . . 7" - --- i:·-· ----=---=--.. . -..... ---·.::.-:... . ::-· -.-:-.. -.. =::-::·:.:.:. - . -~ .:·..- .: -· .. . ":.- - • ~.-_: -·-·-_ ~ -~: · --: --, - - .: --·: . :· ~- -- .---~ :. . _ _: :__ ~- ·>.: ,~--.: .:::. : 1:wokamerDeb~k_.· JD~::·~=-~-~--:· t-_:_ :- :·<.-:.:-~·:-:.:~_-;··'.:- r ..:. , :-.:.i . . . ....... - .... . - .. - .. . . . . . . .. - •• .. • :·:---: - :L'>::J·· :.: · 2- ::·.: ·.-=; ·r. ~:,:.. . _. _-~ -~ -.~ ·:. -~- - ---~- .::<:. _ :_ :·. . .... ·-:... ··.-·· ;·: .. · - •·- - . -.::-.. ::---:.·..- ... -.. --:-:-:-.. .-- -.. --:·_·-"' ••. . •- ··-· ~-~ ~ - . : ! ~:.·.:".· ~·:· '-: -:_:.:-.•: - . ··.:.--:-:-;.:: : • _.. - •· :-_-:, JD: Is there anything else you would like to add? 66:00 JTP: I think I have gone beyond my interview time. I think we _probably good. I appreciate the questions and a chance to walk down memory lane a little bit. Like I said I spent a long time here but in a lot of different situation including physical locations as well as well as the opportunity to connect with people from so many backgrounds. Which I think is a unique vantage point for me. Both having myself physically in other places including out of the country and being in multiple other countries and leading trip to Cuba, Ecuador and other places. It been a good run for a quarter of a century. JD: Thanking you for allowing me to interview you. I have learned so much and I'm sure everybody else will too. . •.. ·····:---. ·_·1 --------- 65:57 67:14 • ·-·· ... --- ·- .J
Show less
- Title
- Transcript of Oral History Interview with Eric Rolland, 2017
- Collection
- HIS 300 Oral History Project
- Search Result
-
INTERVIEW WITH
ERIC ROLLAND
AUGSBURG COLLEGE ORAL mSTORY PROJECT
Interviewed by Julia Mantey
March 8th, 2017
0 March 8th, Augsburg College Archives
Interview with Eric Rolland
Interviewed at Augsburg College,
2211 Riverside Ave.
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Interviewed on March 8th, 2017
Augsbu...
Show more INTERVIEW WITH ERIC ROLLAND AUGSBURG COLLEGE ORAL mSTORY PROJECT Interviewed by Julia Mantey March 8th, 2017 0 March 8th, Augsburg College Archives Interview with Eric Rolland Interviewed at Augsburg College, 2211 Riverside Ave. Minneapolis, Minnesota Interviewed on March 8th, 2017 Augsburg College Oral History Project Interviewed by Julia Mantey Eric Rolland - ER Julia Mantey - JM Time Loi; 0.01 JM: The following interview was conducted with Eric Rolland on behalf of the History 300 Public History Course offered at Augsburg College for the Augsburg Oral History Project. It comes, it took place on March 8th 2017, in the Kennedy Center coaches office and the interview was conducted by Julia Mantey. 0.23 JM: Being that you're an Alumni of Augsburg College, what brought you to Augsburg in the first place? 0.29 ER: In the first place, it was golf. So, the coach at Augsburg back in, many years ago now, 1993 I graduated from high school, the coach here was Brian Ammonn, Brian Ammonn. You might have seen him the other day he was at the, did you see him at the dome the other day? Yeah that guy. And he, sent me a letter and so I met with him and my mom and we, we actually met in now what is the admissions office, that used to be like the school like cafe, so there ya go. Admissions was like in a house over where I think that new CSBR is. That's where the old admissions, like there was a house and the current admissions office is where the old cafeteria was. So we went in there, I think we had a turkey sandwich or something crazy and then he was like what do you want to do and I said that I wanna, can I play, I wanna, if I come here can I play and everything? And he said yeah, you can play and everything. So I'm coming here. So there is the very beginning of Augsburg College. 1.43 JM: Um, what was your experience as a student at Augsburg? 1.48 ER: I don't remember much, honestly. And I don't say that to be funny. I, I mean probably if I give it some thought, which I should. I remember having some interesting philosophy classes. I remember there was one teacher, this is, here's what I remember from school. There was a philosophy professor that, his, I, his sideburns were never the same length. And not only were they not just not the same length but one was like long and one was like too high, like above the ear. You know what I mean? Like you've seen the people like trim their, their sideburns. And there at like the military guys we are weird and fighters or boxers they might like- he had one really up and one, I'll never forget him like. But this was a guy not trying to be cool, I mean he was a guy that regularly would miss a button on his shirt. I think his eyesight or something or he's just, awareness of what was going on was so, I can't remember his name. I remember that. You asked me what my educational experience was like, I remember that guy. There was another philosophy professor, who I believe is still here by the name of Fuehrer, he was, I remember him he was very good, yeah. And he would, he asked me to play badminton, because that was one of my, _I think HPE classes I took, badminton, and he was into badminton, so he came out, he had his tennis shoes on with his black socks you know? And he was working that birdie around the court, man, he was pretty good. Seriously. He may have, I may have let him beat me, but I remember that. I remember, um, just to give you an idea of how like, weird I was, we had J-term back then. I remember ta1cing a nude drawing class, and thinking why did I do this? So, people, various people come in, take their clothes off and we draw them. You're laughing, but, but I mean you had, see I don't remember too much. I remember, um, I chose a marketing major. My education experience, I, I know this, now that I'm forty two, when I was here from eighteen, from the years of eighteen to twenty two years old, I really wasn't ready to learn, I wasn't in a place where I was like ready to learn. That came like, late, mid to late twenties, is when the light came on I was like I'm ready to learn. So, my current, I'm reading six books right now, I read, I usually read about I don't know, three to five books a month so, anyway. Now but I'm not like, when I was twenty, twenty two, I was like, I was um, noticing the sideburns on a philosophy professor. Yeah great question, thank you. 4.41 JM: Um, going off of that, what was your experience as a player at Augsburg? 4.46 ER: Yeah so, it was really interesting because, me, when I say I wasn't ready to learn, that's another way to say immature. Thats a nice way of, that's kinda like a nice way to say that I was really immature. So, as a result, I would beat heads with my coach, a lot you know? And be like, think I was all that. Problem with that, was that, for him, was that I was really good. So we won, we won everything right? I didn't say was won everything, when I was a first year here at Augsburg we finished last place in this big tournament, so I like to say we were like the worst team the fall of my freshman year. And then when I was in the spring of my senior year, on spring break, we went to spring break and beat the number one team in the country and we won the conference championship, and we went to nationals three years in a row so, there was a huge turnaround and there was a couple of other really good players here. So I have a lot of great memories because of all of the winning. But, if you take that and you multiply that times my not being ready to learn yet, uh, it made for a lot of interesting memories. So, probably some that shouldn't be digitized in the archives or Augsburg history. 6.07 JM: Um, what did you do once you graduated from Augsburg? Both in relation to golf and then career wise, in general6.17 ER: Yeah, yeah. Okay. So, when I was a senior, well actually let me rewind that because what I did for work, right out of school, had a lot to do with a guy that I met when I was a freshman, or a sophomore, I think it was a sophomore at Augsburg. I was working at a course called the Minikahda Club, a country club, call the Minikahda Club, down by lake calhoun. And I was working one day and saw this guy,. who's playing golf, and I saw him hit a, hit a shot and it was like unbelievable, it was the best swing, the ball came off of his club like, the ball, it just came off like nobody elses. And I said what, so me with my personality I just go up and say hi to him. Anyway, this guy was ten years older than I was. I was nineteen so I guess I was a sophomore. It might have been the summer after my freshman year, that's what it was. It was the summer after my freshman year, and his name was John, he was a member at Minikahda. Well he played golf for the gophers and then after he was done, he went and played the Australian tour, and then he played some mini tours in Florida and then he had come off of that, sort of retired form that. Gone back to get his MBA at the U of M and he was getting his MBA when I'm, I met him. So he was like hey, listen man, if you want to learn, I'll teach you everything I know about golf. So that was like my first golf mentor, so to speak. So now fast forward to when I'm a senior, um he was bartending at this bar downtown. Sort of, this is sort of the beginning of the end for me. But, he was bartending downtown at this place, the most swinging place called the Palomino, which, if you knew in nineteen ninety five or six that was kind of the swinging place. Anyway, so he gets me a job there, so that was my senior year, I believe it was the fall of my senior year I get hired in what they call the bar back, so I'm like helping the bartenders. So then the money is pretty good right? So now, a few months go by, I kind learn the ropes, graduate from college and get offered, uh, there's a new place that's going to open across the street from the Palomino, which is called Backstage at Bravo, and it's now called something. It's right next to the Orpheum, it's like a three story, can't think of the name of it now, but anyway they invited me over to come open the place, be an opening bartender. Andrew Zimmern, was the chef, the guy that's on the food network, like the bald guy that eat everything crazy. Anyway, he was the chef and like it was a ton of cash. That was the beginning of the end of everything right? So, you take my not being ready to learn yet, multiply times being in the downtown nightlife and sort of the swinging-ness, most happening stuff, um that's what I did with my marketing degree, I made, I bartender, and made quite a bit of dough. Part of the reason that I did that too is because you could work nights, and then you play golf during the day, so I could still play a lot of golf. Which I did, which I did, yeah. In fact, I joined the Pebble Creek in Becker, that's where I was a member and I lived downtown, walked to, like a few blocks to work, but then the next day I'd get up, drive my car all the way up to Becker where our conference championship is in the fall, so I know that place really well. And have a lot of interesting memories from there from that time. 9.42 Augsburg? JM: Um, where has, like your golf career taken you since you graduated from 9.50 ER: To this interview right now, think about it, think about it It's gone a long ways. No, you know what's interesting is, um, I feel like even though I'm talking to an archive, that no one will ever listen to, I, like , cause you're listening to me, like we're really talking but were not really talking so it's kinda weird. But anyway, um, ever since I was twelve, I knew I was going to be a pro, a golf pro. Ever since I was twelve. And I have never, my dream changed a little bit shortly after I got out of college, my dream was I want to get rich so I knew I was going to start a business so I was like trying to get into business with some people and but underneath it all, I knew I was, I always wanted to be a golf pro. That was like my dream. My head I was like rich, my heart I was like golf pro. Anyway, so your question is how does, how did my golf career like lead me to here? Was that the question? 10.45 JM: Or just like, once you were done with your golfing career at Augsburg- 10.49 ER: Yeah 10.51 now, so- JM: What kind of journey did you, cause I know you're a pro at Woodhill, right 10.57 ER: I was, I'm done now. I am full time here at Augsburg, yeah. So I left the swanky country club scene behind, but I see what you're saying. So, I've always know I'm going to be a golf pro, graduated from college, get into branding because there's a lot of cash in a short period of time. Then I meet my wife; right? So that's when I was like oh my gosh, well I have to get rich now because I have to just, you know, lay on a beach somewhere and have a bunch of money coming in. So, you know three businesses down in flames, but underneath all of that was, I know I want to be a golf pro. Under always. So the love for the game of golf. And so um, I basically had, let's see, about a, not quite ten year stretch where um, I'm trying to do something in business. Mortgages, you remember the crash? Yeah, I was right in there, 10.47 JM: Ohno, 10.48 ER: Um, two mortgage companies, a marketing company, we tried to do a youtube concept. For video contests and stuff, two hundred thousand dollars, crash. Our offices was in Ramsey. Anyway, so while all that's going on, still my love for the game of golf never goes away. So now um, fast forward we have one daughter, who's now eleven, business crash and burn I lose everything I have but I, she didn't leave so she's awesome. And then thats when, was like when you crash and burn you're left with really what's in your heart so that was golf. And I went back to it and I got a job as a pro, down in Bent Creek, in Eden Prairie, was there a couple of years, wound up at Woodhill, was there five years. And then during the middle of Woodhill, that's when, I'm guessing this will be another question, but that's when the athletic director at Augsburg called me. And that is how this came about. 12.41 JM: That was my next question- 12.42 ER: So, yeah so it's, it went from, trying to use like a biblical reference, it was like Joseph, I was in the pit and then coming out to the top of college golf mountain. Anyways so that's how, that's where I am today. 12.58 JM: That leads into the next question, how did you end up coming back to Augsburg, to coach? 13.04 ER: Yeah and I think there's a important story in there too, where along the way, before the athletic director, Jeff Swenson here, called me, the coach who was here, was a guy by the name of Ted Vickerman. Now Ted, was a guy that I had met along the way. Where I first met him? I don't remember but I do know that strangely enough I would see him and say hello and, now we never crossed paths, he played golf at Augsburg but we didn't play together, he played after I did, so we had kind of know who each other were, we'd see each other once and awhile and then, um in the spring of like 2012, he had posted for an assistant coach, he needed an assistant coach. And, like it would fit in pretty well, so he hired me, so I got to do that. He did some interesting things, like he had... is that thing out of juice? 14.03 JM: Yeah we're going to pause it right now. 14.04 ER: Sure. 14.07 JM: Going back to the last question I had asked, um- 14.11 ER: Yeah 14.12 JM: How did you end up coming to Augsburg to coach? 14.14 ER: Right, so, around Christmas time of2013 I got a call from our athletic director Jeff Swenson, but there's a backstory to that, which is, the old coach who was here Ted Vickerman, he played at Augsburg, but after I did, so we didn't really cross paths. But, along the way we had connected some, I think though maybe social media or something and anyway he was looking for an assistant coach in the spring of 2012 and it worked out for me so I did it. And I was like the assistant coach for Augsburg and what was great was that he put with the women's team every tournament in the spring, it was great. And I really enjoyed it, he had like 6am. practices the kids hated it, I showed up I'm like this is cool you know? Cause like I just love like, whatever and I don't do that to you guys, make you have 6am. practices. But uh, anyway he had sort of hinted to me that he was, this was a kinda his long term thing so anyway fast forward now to the fall of 2013, almost Christmas of 2013, and he um, he resigned. And when he resigned he told the athletic director, Jeff Swenson, based on Jeffs question to him, who would you replace you? What's great about a lot of athletic directors is that they don't know a thing about golf. Most of them right? I shouldn't say all of them, but most of them are usually, they know the big sports, football or you know that's the big, golf is like a little blip on the thing. So in our case I'm glad he didn't because he, Ted said he should give me a call and he was right. It was a good timing, it was great timing for me and I'm an alumi, it's going to be hard to find someone that could care more about the program and the kids in it to be successful you know? So, that's my opinion anyway so boom that's how it came about. Jeff Swenson called me, I had one meeting with him, he made me the interim coach, then I did an official interview in like June of the next year and then I was the head coach. Yep, but not full time, now it's been two years and change later and I. become full time, yeah. 16.28 had said. JM: What made you choose coaching over your kind of dream to be a pro, as you 16.3 7 ER: Right, so, here's what's interesting about it. So when you're twelve years old, you're matching the masters on TV, which is where I decided, that is where the dream was born, 1987. What year were you born? 16.47 JM: 1997. 16.48 ER: Ok, so ten years before you were born, there I am, a kid watching the masters, Larry Mize chips in on Greg Norman and I was like thats it, thats me I'm gonna be a pro. Well what's interesting was I never had this like clairty, you know like I'm gonna play the PGA tour, that was never it. I just'knew like, I want to be a golf pro. I didn't even really know what that meant but I loved to compete and so I started competing. I think I won my first tournament at thirteen, and I've just been winning tournaments ever since. Because I love to compete you know? Because I'm kind of a ding dong ham and like you know like I like the light and all that stuff. So, anyway, but I never had this like all along I never had this dream. like I'm playing in the PGA tour like never that type of, I don't know how to explain it. There's a lot of different pros, and you want to know what's really interesting is, one of the rarest kind of pros, is a golf pro and a college coach. Like so a PGA like, theres my bag right there, the PGA pro. So that's the, the PGA of America is the largest sporting organization in the world it has well over 27,000 members yeah. And so, that's the largest association of golf pros, not to mention the largest sporting association. But, so if you're a golf pro, and you're not on the PGA tour like Tiger and you see all the guys on TV like if you're not a PGA pro you're not really like a pro. So anyway, I didn't know all this since I was twelve but I, this was sort of my calling, which is cool about Augsburg right? You're vocation man, so anyway, um along the way, I've competed professionally to make money, its great. But, um so here fast forward now, the PGA tour is I don't know, I'm forty two, there's this, no chance of that, but the Minnesota part of the PGA of America has all these tournaments I can play in. So I kinda feel, I call it the Minnesota PGA Tour, even though it's not the PGA Tour that you see on the TV, I call it the Minnesota PGA tour. So I get the play the Minnesota PGA Tour over the summers and the reason why I can do that is because of my standing. Like to be a pro you have to have a job in the golf business. And I'm a college coach which is a recognized classification or something of a pro. Like you can't just be a PGA pro and then like not do anything. So, this is my part of building the game of golf. You would think of the typical PGA pro as the guy, maybe at North Fork who's working the counter, answering the phones, setting up tournaments but, we're all like working in the game of golf to build it and grow it. If that makes sense. And so I still get to play, professionally, which is my dream, just not like you don't see me on TV. Yet, who knows though maybe. maybe I'll discover a miracle drug and next year I'll be out there playing. Lose fifty pounds, maybe the miracle drug is called Liposuction. And also, there's that show called limitless or whatever where you pop a pill and all of a sudden now I can like speak twelve languages and stuff and maybe hit a golf ball in the hole, faster than Rory Mcilroy. We'll see. 19.53 JM: Easy as that. 19.54 ER: Chemistry. Maybe that's my chance. 19.58 JM: Um, what's your overall experience as a coach been like? 20.02 ER: It's been great. I think that um, that's a big question. Because, I didn't realize how many levels coaches, you deal at. Which is probably why I like it more way more than being a pro at the counter. Cause like, if you're the golf pro at the counter and the phone rings and most people are looking for a deal, yes you get to have relationships with people, especially if you're at a country club, and the people are member and you see them regularly and you see their kids and it becomes more relational but I gotta say. This is relational on a whole different level. You know like just the fact that we're doing this interview is because we're having a good relationship as a player and coach. So, and not to mention college, it's such a developmental part of you life. So, it's like as a coach, it's way, for me it's, the golf is the thing that connection point that connects us. But like all the stuff going on in your life, and then like Taylor comes in and then all this stuff going on in her life, and I get to be a part of it. So, that's way deeper than it seems on the surface, and the coach, you might think it's a lot of player development or practicing and you know what I mean? And that is part of it yeah, that's part of it, but there's so many different layers. Life, there's life in there for real. Cause like if you're a pro at a course, if one of your members has a life issue, you'll know about it but like if you're a coach, and you're, one of the players on the team you sperid so much time with and you care about, something happens, you're gonna, it's different, you know what I mean? Plus, I know, you've heard this before, they say that coaches and teachers can have like some of the most significant impact on people's. So it's, it's deep. So the question is ... What was the original question? See I'm good at like running around in circles21.58 JM: No, that's ok. Um, the original question was what's it, what's your overall experience as a coach been like22.04 ER: Yeah- 22.05 JM: Here at Augsburg. 22.06 ER: Yeah. A lot deeper than you would think it is on the surface. I'll just say it that way. Especially if you're competitive and like you want, you're driving to get better. Cause lilce if it was just about the check you know? Like some golf coaches or like high school coaches, I mean, I don't want to accuse high school coaches cause some of them are trying to do their best but they're you know they're driving the kids back and forth, you know it's not enough money to care, really. So, coaching would be all, it can be all consuming. Cause you want people to succeed and so I think there's so many tangents you can go but to ball it all up, it's a lot deeper than you might think it is on the surface. A lot deeper, yeah. 22.46 nationals? JM: Um, what was it like being a fairly new coach and bringing your team to 22.53 ER: Well, see the thing is for me, it was, it was good and bad. It was good in the sense that um, we had made it, you know? And we had kinda broke through a barrier that we hadn't broken through in twenty years but as a pro like I've been playing national events now for a long time, for twenty years. So I've peed my pants enough to know, how to deal with peeing my pants. Which is an expression for being so nervous you can't control your urinary system. But I, but my point is is so that, that part was good that we had to break through but it was bad in the sense that uh, to, watching the guys you know, they're so nervous some of the guys were like there's more nervous than I've ever been in my life. And I'm thinking, we 're just playing golf man, but, but it was great um, it was great. I mean it was, it was great, it was, it's hard you know we didn't make the cut, you wanna make the cut so if you don't accomplish your goals that's apart of it that kind stinks. But, I suppose getting there was the, people say you know, you got there, you know, try to find the silver lining. But I think it was good, I'm looking forward to many more in the future. Cause I wanna, Augsburg golf to be in the conversation, you know? Like we'll get there on the men's side, on the women's side, to be part of the conversation like that's a good golf program at Augsburg. You know they may not say all, like Augsburg wrestling like ah you're dead if you're wrong. If you're wrestling against Augsburg you're dead, they're national champs every year. That'd be cool, but I mean more like, we're just like in the, in the conversation. So it's good, I think that helped. 24.28 JM: Um, what is it like, in terms, I know we had talked about this before but kinda, going deeper into it, you had talked about your role as a coach and your coaching styles compared to other coaches. Um, how do you think that your style differs from a lot of other coaching styles? 24.54 ER: Good question, well I think you know, I've got a certain personality that God gave me so, people don't like it they can be mad at him but, I'm kidding only kinda on that I think you gotta be true to who you are, right? So if, if you're the head coach of a team, like I am, I mean, I have to try to be who I am right? I mean that's what, if I'm trying to be somebody else I can only probably do that so long. So my style is gunna be more like so, so you got the individual on one side and you got the team. Here's what's cool about golf right? So you're an individual you play in your own individual score but then you have the team thing right? So if we were just a team sport like football or basketball you pretty much have to put the team first in everything right? Because there's no individual, I mean there's individual awards right? But in golf you can, you can win a tournament individually and as a team. So where's the balance there right? So I would say, I'm, I go on the side of the player, because people are different. People prepare differently, they think differently, but I think if all of a sudden you start getting really strong players and a lot of them, then you may have to shift, I may have to shift more. So, I think it's, it's moving but I would say my coaching style is trying to be in tune to an individual's needs. You know? So some coaches might, how that might be different is if somebody would be like I don't really care what your problems are. It's team first, you see what I mean? So I might sacrifice a little bit of team feeling but individual feel, feel pretty good about what's going on, does that make sense? I, I think I'm more a little more oil that side and that's on purpose. Because I think if you have all individuals bought in, then the team thing will happen. Rather than like listen this is the team, that, that's me. Um, also, yeah yeah. Just because, I've played enough golf, I've met enough people I know enough different golfers that people learn differently they think differently. How they grow is different, so to think that we're going to do it one way for everybody, in golf, you know it's gonna be ... I think I'll lose some individuals at the sake of the team game. Whereas I feel like we have good individual, you know, people feel good individually and maybe the team doesn't go as, but you know what I mean? Like, I think twenty years later, I'd rather have a great individual relationship you than look back and go like oh wow we hated each other but I'll tell you what that team was good weren't we? You know what I mean? That's where I'm at right now as a coach. So what's funny, when I look back, our team was good and I butted heads with the coach right? So I, coach differently maybe that's because of the, partly because of that. But yeah, I mean I think also too, because I can take a subject and drag it out forever. Being a PGA pro means that, the game of golf, I want the game of golf to win, you know? And so I meet a lot of kids, I don't know how many you know that play D2, D1 golf on scholarship but you sort of loose some individuality when you take a scholarship. Which is nothing wrong with taking a scholarship, you should right? If you're offered one and you want one, and it's a good school, good for everything than do it right? But, you're, you're taking the money from the school and you're saying part of my I'm you know, whatev~r the program is, I'm doing that regardless, so where was I going with that? I forgot The point is, is that I know kids that burned out because they take a scholarship and they think it's cool and they have to do all this stuff for the the team, for the program right? So then they burn out, they're mad, they're individually burned out and they're kinda upset with the game golf. And they get like, right? So, I feel like I'm more of an organic golf farmer, you know rather than this mass, it's like each plant's an individual, I'm trying to help it grow. And you so I have that good relationship that, and then also the game of golf, like you said. I hope everybody keeps playing golf, that's like the main thing, because then I think golf is good for you, yeah. Very short question but very long answer, I'm good at that. 29.26 JM: That's ok. Um, how do you think the dynamics have changed at Augsburg from your time as a student,_ um to today? So the dynamics and just Augsburg and as a whole. 29.40 ER: Yeah, you know I definitely think that, that the diversity piece continues to grow. I think, Augsburg seems to be a leader in, in the world of diversity, and frankly I think it's great, I think it's fantastic. So I mean that, I think you have to be careful because, because you know this is what we call a politically, a liberal area right? So I just think that if you go too far you know what I mean? Like, there's a lot of people sorta in the middle, you know? I, I think it's gone more diverse which I think is great and I think, I, I just say you know, heritage is this Christian missionary, Norwegian Missionary, which is like taking the gospel, I think if you can go so far away from that,then I don't know, I don't know quite the answer to that. That's just my personal opinion. I wonder if that's, ifit's gone so far away from, from its beginnings um, of course we still, they still call it you know, still a Lutheran Church, and the ELCA. There's, there's chapel every day, which is cool but I, what I do like is that diversity, it's great to see all the different people. It's, it's just really cool, cause you know you realize how cool God is and he makes people all differently, you know we have all these different background and we look different and um, I think it really opens you up to, it really, I think it's a really valuable experience here at Augsburg. Because then, when you go out in the world you realize the importance of diversity. Of the fact that, there's all this different opinions that you just, you don't just, you stop and think ok, well what are these, what are these other thoughts? What are your opinions? What can, cause so many people can add so much to it, um anyway, but I just, I, I wonder if you have a lot of people that are sort of in the middle, like Minnesota's kind of a, you look at the election it was about 50/50, even though people here, you know think Trump's insane, which he is, but I mean, I'm just saying you know, you know, you wonder if you go so far in one direction are you going to start leaving a lot of people, out. And then is that, that's not diversity either. Anyway, that's some ofmy, some ofmy thoughts. Some of things I just wonder about, but I'm not on the board, I'm on the golf course, yeah. Does that answer that question, you think? My thoughts of Augsburg, how it's changed? 32.15 JM: Yeah, I meanjust. .. 32.17 ER: I feel like a lot of its roots are the same. I feel like it's become more diverse. I feel like the um, there's been new buildings since I left, new library, Oren Gateway, CSBR's come up. This is all new, Kennedy, is new, it's good. 32.36 JM: When you say some of the roots are the same, how do you elaborate on that? 32.43 ER: Well the diversity piece, I think also meeting some the people that have been around here a long long time, um I recognize them from when I went here. That's, that's kinda what I mean by that. Um, certain key contributors, alumni, you know? Anyway, I, you know, honestly I haven't dove into a lot of the political stuff, the student life, I stay focused on the, on the golf part, you know what I mean? 33.22 JM: Mh-hm. 33.23 ER: So, and, and frankly, well like I told you when I was at school here, I was really not in ready to learn yet so I was sort of in my own little bubble. So when we talk about how the school's governed and how the school's managed and lead I, I shouldn't speak too much about that because I don't, I'm not like, I haven't gone on committees and councils and you know what I mean? I'm just observing as, as my experience. I love seeing all the different people, I think that that's cool and that's grown from when I went to school here to when, to now. Yeah. 34.59 Fame? JM: Um, what is it like knowing that you're going to be inducted into the Hall of 34.04 ER: Well, I assume, I shouldn't say I, I know yet we'll see. You have to be twenty years out. I think, but I think all americans are automatic so, I think you know, um probably take a month vacation to Disneyland probably. I meant it's going to be epic. No um, I don't, I, think it's weird. I mean it just tells me that I think that underneath it I've always had a strong passion for golf. I mean that's just what, pretty much,-because I think you can do all this training you can do all like. You have, you have passion for something, that's your clue, that's where you want to follow that. You know what I mean? And I, I would say that of all the people I've met, in my life, very few have had the passion for golf that I have. That's because, not everybody, you know what I mean? Um, but I think the Hall of Fame is just a reflection of the passion and I don't think you give yourself passion. I don't think you do. You, you can't like, I didn't put the, like when I was watching the Masters when I was twelve it just came, it just became clear. I didn't put it there, it was I realized it was there, that's my opinion. I don't think, it's an interesting subject I, frankly I don't know there's been many, there's had to be some books written on this subject, but passion, I think that it's in like your DNA. I think God puts it in there because I think people are created with a purpose. You know you're not just random, but you're not just here, wondering around, people have a purpose right? That's like the idea of Augsburg, is fmd your vocation, your place, your calling. Um, not just fmd a cool job, but what's your calling? So, and how are you calling, you know you don't call yourself. Right? You're created with a calling because there's something you're here to do, and that connects I think to passion and, and so that's what's, that's what's cool in my world, is golf obviously. So I think that's what reflects in the hall of fame. And when you look at sports I mean who gets really good it, is people that have really strong want to. Then they figure out all these little details, but if you say we're going to focus on the details and somebody doesn't have a passion then it's like, that was like me in class. Like we're talking about accounting and like zero, I'm done man. But i get it, you had to do it to pass but... long and winding road for what I think about the hall of fame. I think it reflects passion. 36.30 university? JM: Um, what are your thoughts on Augsburg changing its name from college to 36.35 ER: Well, it was an unanimous among the board and everybody so it's probably a good thing. I guess we're not really a college technically because we have graduate school. So we're AU and we're getting a new logo which has got like a crazy eye looking eye eagle he's like eh. Have I shown you the eagle? I've shown you that So you can see the eye on the eagle right there, well actually this is the guy right here, but it's the eye, you can see, he looks like he's winking. He's sorta like he's like a little eyeshadow or she like she like. Now it's like an eagle that's coming in for lunch, he's coming to get something, so, it's tougher. The school seal is going to change. Back in the 60's when they made this seal for school the tallest building in downtown was the Foshey, so now it's like the city landscape will change. Have you seen the new seal logo? OK, and then Augsburg University is, cool. I guess internationally it's a positive because student internationally think of college as like, like high school I mean. And they think of university of college, doesn't make sense but so apparently it's good. I think it's good. What do you think? Wait, I'm not interviewing you, can you be interviewed on this? But then you'd have to write it out wouldn't you? Yeah you don't want to do that. I've already said too much. Do you have to write out everything that I am saying? No, oh my God. Ok. 38.00 JM: You're good. No, its- 38.03 ER: Can you edit it? 38.04 JM: No- 38.05 ER: You're screwed. You should have told me this up front. 38.08 JM: I did. 38.09 ER: You did? 38.10 JM: Yeah. 38.11 ER: Ok, well last question. 38.12 JM: Um, overall, um, through your years of experience at Augsburg, how would you describe it? From you know the time of being a student to kind of going full circle and coaching these new38.32 golf. ER: It's fun. It's fun being involved in people's lives, and around the game of 38.42 JM: Alright um- 38.43 ER: Dude, can you, ok. 38.46 JM: Last question. Where do you see um, yourself progressing in the coming years like, would you want to stay a coach 38.55 ER: Yeah. 38.57 JM: Um, where do you think the game of Augsburg golf will go? 39.04 ER: You know, Jeff Swenson, the athletic director says,just get a little bit better, so I, I see things just getting a little bit better. What does that mean players just having a better time, um we get better up the standings but just good people. Good chemistry, good people, just getting a little bit better every year. Who knows where it leads I don't know. We talk about focusing on the process, you know, just trying to get a little bit better every day, and let the result take care of themselves. So, I mean yeah I've got a dream to be national champions but I mean there's, in golf you have, in the sports you have two obvious things. You have your conference championship and then the national championship right? So it's like but, if every day you try to get a little but better, let the results take care of themselves and I plan on being here a long time. 39.56 JM: Good, alright. Well thank you for your time, and for the interview- 40.03 ER: Yeah. 40.05 JM: And I look forward to continuing on with this.
Show less