WEBVTT 00:00:01.020 --> 00:00:05.417 at the time I retired, I was a member of the, what was in the department 00:00:05.450 --> 00:00:10.836 of accounting now with the school of accountancy as a faculty member, just 00:00:10.869 --> 00:00:13.447 for a little bit of background, why don't you tell us when you were born 00:00:13.480 --> 00:00:19.197 and where you were born? I was born way back in 1919 00:00:19.230 --> 00:00:22.806 in grand rapids michigan. 00:00:22.839 --> 00:00:28.087 And um what did your family do with my family? Were in the furniture 00:00:28.120 --> 00:00:31.767 business. Grand rapids was at that time probably the furniture capital of 00:00:31.800 --> 00:00:36.277 the world. And my father who was a dutch immigrant boy who had come over 00:00:36.310 --> 00:00:41.057 at the age of 13, I began by working in furniture factories, but then 00:00:41.090 --> 00:00:44.637 before too long became superintendent of a very large plant in grand 00:00:44.670 --> 00:00:49.307 rapids and then subsequently went into the retail business which he was in 00:00:49.340 --> 00:00:53.667 until he retired. Did you help out in the businesses? I have worked there. 00:00:53.700 --> 00:00:58.516 Oh, yes, I've worked, I've worked on the bench making furniture in 00:00:58.549 --> 00:01:03.967 factories and I have been on the sales floor and so on. Yes. So as a boy 00:01:04.000 --> 00:01:06.326 growing up, what did you, do you have any idea what you're going to do 00:01:06.359 --> 00:01:10.436 when you grow up? Well, I first of all wanted an education and that was 00:01:10.469 --> 00:01:14.066 the thing that the family very much supported. So I knew I would go to 00:01:14.099 --> 00:01:19.406 college and while in college, I first had the notion of going to law 00:01:19.439 --> 00:01:25.777 school. However, I kind of rethought that one and simply got a liberal 00:01:25.810 --> 00:01:28.117 arts education. 00:01:28.150 --> 00:01:31.126 And where did you go to college? It was a small school in grand rapids 00:01:31.159 --> 00:01:36.016 called Calvin College. Which from its name you might conclude is probably 00:01:36.049 --> 00:01:40.176 church because it's named after john Calvin of course. And it is a part of 00:01:40.209 --> 00:01:45.607 the dutch reform group of people. So what was your major? I majored in 00:01:45.640 --> 00:01:51.837 sociology and economics. That's an interesting combination. How did you 00:01:51.870 --> 00:01:55.536 come up with that combination? Uh I think mostly because of the professors 00:01:55.569 --> 00:02:02.447 , I've always been a person who goes with the people. Uh you get great 00:02:02.480 --> 00:02:07.007 knowledge and great great preparation if you if you get the right people, 00:02:07.040 --> 00:02:12.827 whatever the subject. What was your first job out of college? Ah My first 00:02:12.860 --> 00:02:17.856 job, remember of course this was Depression Days. My first job was an 00:02:17.889 --> 00:02:22.856 inspector in a metal producing factory. That I don't mean they produce 00:02:22.889 --> 00:02:27.066 metal. Let me restate that. The metal parts for the auto industry. I 00:02:27.099 --> 00:02:31.547 worked for 40 cents an hour. That doesn't seem to have much relationship 00:02:31.580 --> 00:02:35.106 to your college education. 00:02:35.139 --> 00:02:39.346 I could have done that without finishing high school. So how long did you 00:02:39.379 --> 00:02:43.416 do that? About two years. And then I went to work in a furniture 00:02:43.449 --> 00:02:47.087 manufacturing firm because I could work piece work there and makes 60 00:02:47.120 --> 00:02:51.156 cents an hour? Big deal. 00:02:51.189 --> 00:02:55.626 What time period was that again? This was in the late thirties and running 00:02:55.659 --> 00:02:58.906 up to World War Two. 00:02:58.939 --> 00:03:03.286 So what did you do during World War Two? Well I was in the service for 00:03:03.319 --> 00:03:10.006 more than three years overseas in the mediterranean area for 28 months. 00:03:10.039 --> 00:03:13.976 Any special things there. What what part of the service were you in? I was 00:03:14.009 --> 00:03:19.906 in the, what was then called the Army Air Corps. I had seven battle stars. 00:03:19.939 --> 00:03:26.927 So I was in the war. Were you a pilot? I was a radio man. But you were 00:03:26.960 --> 00:03:32.527 flying part of the time. How did you earn those stars? Well you you earned 00:03:32.560 --> 00:03:37.487 those by simply being a participant in in defined battles. The other thing 00:03:37.520 --> 00:03:43.267 I learned which which you have to earn is a brown star which is for duties 00:03:43.300 --> 00:03:49.316 and activities beyond the minimum one has to perform. Was there a special 00:03:49.349 --> 00:03:54.536 event that? Well there was a series of things actually and I have lost the 00:03:54.569 --> 00:03:59.707 document that accompanied and I frankly don't remember what it said. Mhm. 00:03:59.740 --> 00:04:05.527 Doesn't seem like that's something you'd forget. Well I do. I have so he 00:04:05.560 --> 00:04:09.867 went from from michigan into the services. That's correct. And then what 00:04:09.900 --> 00:04:12.427 did you do when you came back? So I decided I didn't want to live in 00:04:12.460 --> 00:04:19.296 michigan anymore. So I went to Denver. Why Denver? Partly because I had an 00:04:19.329 --> 00:04:22.796 uncle there who might have visited prior to the war and found it a very 00:04:22.829 --> 00:04:26.426 attractive place and I thought it was going to be a growing place in an 00:04:26.459 --> 00:04:31.606 exciting place to live. What did you do there? 00:04:31.639 --> 00:04:37.507 Having had some experience in the furniture game? I decided that I would 00:04:37.540 --> 00:04:42.306 found a furniture manufacturing firm 00:04:42.339 --> 00:04:46.517 because upon doing a little bit of informal market research I concluded 00:04:46.550 --> 00:04:52.346 that they lacked a manufacturer making high end furniture which was my 00:04:52.379 --> 00:04:57.806 specialty. So I went into that business and did rather well. 00:04:57.839 --> 00:05:01.606 What kind of furniture? 00:05:01.639 --> 00:05:05.406 How long did you do that? I do it, that's that until I came here 14 years 00:05:05.439 --> 00:05:10.556 later. What brought you to Arizona? Maybe you ought to ask me what else I 00:05:10.589 --> 00:05:15.577 did when I was in Denver? Well because you understand now I've had a 00:05:15.610 --> 00:05:21.426 liberal arts education and yet I ended up as a professor in business. One 00:05:21.459 --> 00:05:27.346 doesn't do that without some education and business does one. So um the gi 00:05:27.379 --> 00:05:32.096 bill was of course an effect at that time and I thought I might as well 00:05:32.129 --> 00:05:35.926 take advantage of it. So I went to the University of Denver and got a 00:05:35.959 --> 00:05:39.406 bachelor's degree in accounting 00:05:39.439 --> 00:05:43.767 then I enjoyed that so much and it's still time on the G. I. Bill, so why 00:05:43.800 --> 00:05:47.207 not get a master's degree? So I did that. Of course, you understand this 00:05:47.240 --> 00:05:50.106 is all at night. 00:05:50.139 --> 00:05:54.496 And upon concluding that the then chairman of the accounting department 00:05:54.529 --> 00:05:57.757 says Bill, why don't you teach a course for me in the fall? And I said 00:05:57.790 --> 00:06:02.496 yeah that would be kind of a kick, I'll give that a try by the end of this 00:06:02.529 --> 00:06:05.976 fall quarter. He said Bill why don't you come and teach full time for me. 00:06:06.009 --> 00:06:11.897 And I said whoa I've got a business to run and full time was 15 hours of 00:06:11.930 --> 00:06:16.536 teaching at the University of Denver at that time, he said, ah you can do 00:06:16.569 --> 00:06:22.556 it. So I said, well, I'll give it a try. So from then on I talked 15 hours 00:06:22.589 --> 00:06:28.366 at the University of Denver and ran a business. How did you do? It takes 00:06:28.399 --> 00:06:33.707 to be young. That helps and you have to have a very high energy level and 00:06:33.740 --> 00:06:37.947 a willingness to forego a lot of social life. Then I took a leave from 00:06:37.980 --> 00:06:41.356 both the University of Denver and my business to get a PhD at the 00:06:41.389 --> 00:06:44.306 University of michigan. 00:06:44.339 --> 00:06:51.296 And then I came here. What made you decide to leave your business? And 00:06:51.329 --> 00:06:56.447 the fact is that I had been coming to this area for a kind of a winter 00:06:56.480 --> 00:07:02.536 break in late March for a number of years. And on the occasion in 1959 00:07:02.569 --> 00:07:07.606 that I came down as you have just become a university. And I knew that I 00:07:07.639 --> 00:07:12.406 thought, well go out to that campus and look it over and be kind of a kick. 00:07:12.439 --> 00:07:15.426 So I did. And found my way to the College of Business and they're of 00:07:15.459 --> 00:07:20.616 course met Glenn Overman who was the dean. Well, to make the long story 00:07:20.649 --> 00:07:25.806 short before I left that later that week, I had glenn saying, Bill, why 00:07:25.839 --> 00:07:31.906 don't you come down and join us in the fall to which I responded, 00:07:31.939 --> 00:07:36.666 glen, I can't do that, I have a business to run. And they're expecting me 00:07:36.699 --> 00:07:43.027 back at the University of Denver. Well he put the grain of an idea into my 00:07:43.060 --> 00:07:48.306 mind and I started cohabitating on that one. And it led me to explore the 00:07:48.339 --> 00:07:54.007 possibility of selling the business and I lead a charmed life I think 00:07:54.040 --> 00:07:58.286 because of a buyer came along and wanted to buy my business at my price at 00:07:58.319 --> 00:08:05.327 just the critical moment. So I said why not? And moved here now, that was 00:08:05.360 --> 00:08:09.897 before or after you got your PhD. I had completed all of the work on the 00:08:09.930 --> 00:08:13.906 PhD but had not yet written a dissertation. 00:08:13.939 --> 00:08:18.306 So you had taken that break and gone to michigan 00:08:18.339 --> 00:08:24.306 actually I took a year off here to go back and do the dissertation. 00:08:24.339 --> 00:08:28.906 So when did you actually come to work at A. S. U. In the fall of 1959? 00:08:28.939 --> 00:08:34.407 That same year that things moved quickly. 00:08:34.440 --> 00:08:38.677 What was that actually like in 1959? Well it was a very intimate kind of 00:08:38.710 --> 00:08:42.657 place. Like I still want to remember going to the Memorial Union for 00:08:42.690 --> 00:08:46.717 coffee in the morning crossing busy college avenue with all of its car 00:08:46.750 --> 00:08:51.457 traffic and uh and then spending time with people from all parts of the 00:08:51.490 --> 00:08:56.197 university. It was a small community then. And as I say, it was a 00:08:56.230 --> 00:09:01.677 remarkably friendly community. I remember that fall going to an event in 00:09:01.710 --> 00:09:06.146 Grady Gammage his backyard and as you probably know, he lived on the 00:09:06.179 --> 00:09:12.287 campus and meeting just all the newcomers there and, and having, having 00:09:12.320 --> 00:09:17.396 just a wonderful social event. It was a small school. The College of 00:09:17.429 --> 00:09:22.356 Business had I think 12 professors at that time or so well, by that time 00:09:22.389 --> 00:09:26.337 it was a little more when they started it was 12, but that many years 00:09:26.370 --> 00:09:29.917 later it had grown considerably already. I think there were close to about 00:09:29.950 --> 00:09:36.187 10,000 students here at the time. And what was your first job? My first 00:09:36.220 --> 00:09:41.346 job was as an assistant professor in the department of accounting 00:09:41.379 --> 00:09:46.187 assistant professor. You had your masters and we're working on your and of 00:09:46.220 --> 00:09:49.817 course even at that time you needed to have the PhD or you weren't going 00:09:49.850 --> 00:09:55.917 to be retained. Where was the College of Business located? It was in the, 00:09:55.950 --> 00:09:59.746 the, what was once the agriculture business building, which is a wing from 00:09:59.779 --> 00:10:03.846 the administration building, but the College of Business had taken over 00:10:03.879 --> 00:10:09.026 the entire building by that time. And so how large was it again? The 00:10:09.059 --> 00:10:14.197 college itself really? I don't have those figures at hand. I'd have to 00:10:14.230 --> 00:10:21.207 make a speculative guess. I'd rather not. Okay. Um, 00:10:21.240 --> 00:10:25.516 but it was a small, fairly small department or was it a college at that 00:10:25.549 --> 00:10:30.667 time? It was a college and become a college in 1955. Even though the issue 00:10:30.700 --> 00:10:34.506 was still in college and not a university, 00:10:34.539 --> 00:10:39.266 we had colleges within the college back in those days. It's always been 00:10:39.299 --> 00:10:45.006 something that confuses me, always get it wrong and offend somebody. Um So 00:10:45.039 --> 00:10:48.187 who was the chairman of the department? Who was it that hired you? Well, 00:10:48.220 --> 00:10:54.087 the chairman was charlie Burton who had had been here since 1941. He had 00:10:54.120 --> 00:10:59.687 come just just prior to the start of the war, but he was a youngish man 00:10:59.720 --> 00:11:03.827 with a family and so he never had to go into service and he stayed on and 00:11:03.860 --> 00:11:10.606 continued until his retirement in oh there seven mid seventies I'd say, 00:11:10.639 --> 00:11:16.746 what was he like? He's a charming guy. He he was a C. P. A of course and 00:11:16.779 --> 00:11:21.907 did practice. In fact, he even did some practice while he was a professor. 00:11:21.940 --> 00:11:26.986 But no, he was he was just a delightful man. And you mentioned that the 00:11:27.019 --> 00:11:32.016 university president at that time was Grady Gammage, but he I arrived in 00:11:32.049 --> 00:11:37.957 september 1st september here and he died in december as I recall. Was that 00:11:37.990 --> 00:11:42.246 what was that like? Well it was for the community. I I met him only once, 00:11:42.279 --> 00:11:46.217 so it didn't affect me terribly personally, but for the community, it was 00:11:46.250 --> 00:11:50.506 pretty devastating at the time because he was a greatly respected and much 00:11:50.539 --> 00:11:53.606 loved leader here. 00:11:53.639 --> 00:11:57.817 How did things change after that? I think the biggest change was that by 00:11:57.850 --> 00:12:02.636 fall of 60 and then that's pretty fast in today's world, by the way, you 00:12:02.669 --> 00:12:07.817 don't get new presidents that quickly today. But by fall of 60 we had a 00:12:07.850 --> 00:12:13.016 new president and it was ji Homer Durham and it turns out in my personal 00:12:13.049 --> 00:12:16.707 view that one of the best things that ever happened to issue was hiring 00:12:16.740 --> 00:12:22.697 Gee homer Durham who was a great catalyst, great leader, charismatic 00:12:22.730 --> 00:12:29.776 leader, a a dreamer, a futurist and along with that and just an absolutely 00:12:29.809 --> 00:12:36.187 wonderful man of unquestioned integrity, one of my most admired people. Do 00:12:36.220 --> 00:12:41.266 you have any special stories that you remember about him? Well, there are 00:12:41.299 --> 00:12:45.506 a lot of, a lot of stories I guess one could refer to in the general 00:12:45.539 --> 00:12:48.866 history. He was he was a man who of many parts he was what I'd call a 00:12:48.899 --> 00:12:54.297 renaissance man. He was a great academician. He had high standards, but 00:12:54.330 --> 00:12:57.557 along with that, believe it or not, he's the one that's responsible for 00:12:57.590 --> 00:13:02.037 the Fiesta bowl. He was the one who dreamed that idea up and and and 00:13:02.070 --> 00:13:08.506 fostered it. One of the things I do remember about him was in 1967 00:13:08.539 --> 00:13:13.177 when I was chairman of the accounting department. Glenn Overman went off 00:13:13.210 --> 00:13:19.047 on a six month sabbatical. So I had also to be acting Dean during his 00:13:19.080 --> 00:13:23.256 absence. So here I am chairman of the department and Acting Dean. And G 00:13:23.289 --> 00:13:27.026 Homer calls over and says, come on over Bill, I want to talk to you and I 00:13:27.059 --> 00:13:32.876 said, okay, uh he said, you know, we've just lost our controller here in 00:13:32.909 --> 00:13:37.177 the university, I want you to take on the job of controller. Well, it 00:13:37.210 --> 00:13:42.667 struck me that two jobs was funny. Three was one too many. So I had to say 00:13:42.700 --> 00:13:47.437 to ji homer really. You understand, I have these obligations with Glenn 00:13:47.470 --> 00:13:52.587 and so on. So of course that went by the board but it was wonderful to be 00:13:52.620 --> 00:13:56.707 thought of highly enough to be asked. 00:13:56.740 --> 00:14:00.467 Well, tell me a little bit about what your responsibilities were when you 00:14:00.500 --> 00:14:05.807 first started here as an assistant professor teaching 12 hours, which was 00:14:05.840 --> 00:14:08.996 an improvement over the 15 hours. I was teaching at the University of 00:14:09.029 --> 00:14:15.717 Denver. Ah but it was mainly teaching and counseling students for that 00:14:15.750 --> 00:14:22.307 first year. How was the pay here? Well, that's an interesting point. You 00:14:22.340 --> 00:14:26.157 have to realize that I was a pretty successful businessman in Denver and 00:14:26.190 --> 00:14:32.256 was accustomed to a fairly high standard of living. And so the $6250 00:14:32.289 --> 00:14:37.116 contract I was given my first year was not going to support my standard of 00:14:37.149 --> 00:14:41.496 living and I'll be very candid with you. I would never have taken a full 00:14:41.529 --> 00:14:46.766 time position in education if I had had to try to live on what was being 00:14:46.799 --> 00:14:52.736 paid in those days, fortunately I had the luxury of supplementary income 00:14:52.769 --> 00:14:58.047 from my previous operations. Did you start other businesses down here then 00:14:58.080 --> 00:15:04.750 ? No, no, no. My commitment to education from then on the rest of my life. 00:15:08.840 --> 00:15:10.840 Tell me a little bit about how your career progressed from being an 00:15:11.960 --> 00:15:15.976 assistant professor. Well that was the first year as I said and before the 00:15:16.009 --> 00:15:20.516 first year was out Glenn called me and Glenn Overman Of course when I say 00:15:20.549 --> 00:15:25.346 Glenn you'll know who I mean. Glenn called me in and said you know Bill I 00:15:25.379 --> 00:15:28.526 don't have anyone in the office for me. All he had by the way was a 00:15:28.559 --> 00:15:34.146 secretary and some student help to run the college 00:15:34.179 --> 00:15:39.207 if you want to contrast that with today's world why I invite you to do so 00:15:39.240 --> 00:15:42.006 um 00:15:42.039 --> 00:15:46.827 He said I really need an assistant dean and I would like to have you to be 00:15:46.860 --> 00:15:53.197 my assistant dean. So what do I say? Well of course I said yes so for the 00:15:53.230 --> 00:15:58.486 next two years I was also his assistant dean. And then in the fourth year 00:15:58.519 --> 00:16:03.236 I was here that's when I took my leave without pay to go back to michigan 00:16:03.269 --> 00:16:05.807 to do the dissertation. 00:16:05.840 --> 00:16:09.476 Why did you go ahead and do that? Why did you feel the need to go back and 00:16:09.509 --> 00:16:14.266 do that to do the dissertation? Well there were several reasons for it. I 00:16:14.299 --> 00:16:17.827 am the main one being if I wanted to stay at A. S. U. I had to complete 00:16:17.860 --> 00:16:22.236 the degree or I'm I'm history. That would be a good enough reason by 00:16:22.269 --> 00:16:25.837 itself wouldn't it? But the other part of it is very candidly for better 00:16:25.870 --> 00:16:30.266 or for worse the academic world requires you to have that degree if you're 00:16:30.299 --> 00:16:36.506 going to be first class citizen and I'd like to be a first class citizen. 00:16:36.539 --> 00:16:40.636 So when you came back from that, then what was your position back to his 00:16:40.669 --> 00:16:45.807 assistant professor for one semester? 00:16:45.840 --> 00:16:50.226 And then Glenn called me in and said I'm going to replace charlie Burton 00:16:50.259 --> 00:16:52.896 as the chairman of the accounting department. I want you to become the 00:16:52.929 --> 00:16:57.407 chairman. So of course I said yes. 00:16:57.440 --> 00:17:01.837 And then for the next 5.5 years I was chairman of the accounting 00:17:01.870 --> 00:17:06.046 department. And during, as I mentioned before, during that 16 month period 00:17:06.079 --> 00:17:13.717 , also acting dean and teaching except for that one semester. So the 00:17:13.750 --> 00:17:17.056 chairman of the apartment department, what were your responsibilities? 00:17:17.089 --> 00:17:21.286 Well, of course it was administration of everything, hiring, recruiting, 00:17:21.319 --> 00:17:29.319 managing the, the budget and I taught six hours, which was in halftime. 00:17:29.809 --> 00:17:33.276 And how was the university changing during that time? Well, this was the 00:17:33.309 --> 00:17:37.387 period of the sixties with Homer Durham, which I consider some really 00:17:37.420 --> 00:17:42.197 glory years in the history of this institution. We were growing 00:17:42.230 --> 00:17:46.576 numerically, but more importantly we were growing in terms of stature and 00:17:46.609 --> 00:17:52.357 quality because gee Homer was a person who absolutely drove you in that 00:17:52.390 --> 00:17:58.766 direction. And so it was, it was the most gratifying period. Uh it's more 00:17:58.799 --> 00:18:02.316 specifically in the college of business. One of the important things that 00:18:02.349 --> 00:18:05.607 happened. Maybe one of the most important things that happened during that 00:18:05.640 --> 00:18:11.677 decade was the fact that we became accredited by the accrediting body of 00:18:11.710 --> 00:18:14.826 business schools. This is a professional school accreditation over and 00:18:14.859 --> 00:18:21.417 above of course the North Central and it turned out that that happened 00:18:21.450 --> 00:18:25.016 while I was assistant dean. And so I spearheaded that and pretty much 00:18:25.049 --> 00:18:29.457 wrote the two volume report that had to be prepared and then went with 00:18:29.490 --> 00:18:34.566 Glenn to the meetings in Chicago at which we were granted full 00:18:34.599 --> 00:18:39.836 accreditation on our first application. Rather an unusual thing. And some 00:18:39.869 --> 00:18:42.637 perhaps more prestigious school of those that were applying at the same 00:18:42.670 --> 00:18:48.197 time were turned down. So I guess we must have done things right. What 00:18:48.230 --> 00:18:52.266 difference did it make to be accredited? Oh it means that your credits are 00:18:52.299 --> 00:18:57.427 accepted by all other major institutions. They would question them that 00:18:57.460 --> 00:19:02.127 you'd even get questions in for in some states For example from states 00:19:02.160 --> 00:19:05.326 boards of accountancy if your accounting students wanted to sit for the C 00:19:05.359 --> 00:19:09.316 . P. A. Exam in that state if they didn't have their degree from an 00:19:09.349 --> 00:19:12.836 accredited school and I mean accredited by the professional accrediting 00:19:12.869 --> 00:19:18.556 body they might reject them. So yes it became very it was a very important 00:19:18.589 --> 00:19:23.957 development. So did that change as a as a school or college of the 00:19:23.990 --> 00:19:28.387 students that you were getting students adopted? It had a lot of effect on 00:19:28.420 --> 00:19:31.826 that after all. There are a lot of accredited schools, many of them much 00:19:31.859 --> 00:19:37.707 older than a. S. U. I. I doubt that. 00:19:37.740 --> 00:19:41.766 Do you remember any other things that were going on on campus at that time 00:19:41.799 --> 00:19:47.066 that that you got involved in or that you just observed? Well yes I think 00:19:47.099 --> 00:19:50.016 one of the important ones again from the college point of view was that we 00:19:50.049 --> 00:19:55.306 established our own PhD program that happened during the middle sixties. 00:19:55.339 --> 00:19:59.056 And that was a very significant thing. And it really brought us a lot of 00:19:59.089 --> 00:20:05.407 attention and probably did a lot to enhance our reputation 00:20:05.440 --> 00:20:09.957 and to be involved in. That was an exciting event. What did that take? How 00:20:09.990 --> 00:20:14.546 do you, well if you have of course first of all to get approval from the 00:20:14.579 --> 00:20:17.637 top administration here at the university and then from the board of 00:20:17.670 --> 00:20:21.467 regions. But you have to do a lot of research indicating what kind of a 00:20:21.500 --> 00:20:24.677 degree you're going to give, what the composition is going to be. You know 00:20:24.710 --> 00:20:29.316 all the details have to be set forth. It took a lot of study, it took a 00:20:29.349 --> 00:20:34.437 lot of comparison with other institutions. Uh And you have to have a 00:20:34.470 --> 00:20:38.197 mission statement, a kind of a goal. You know and you have to pretty much 00:20:38.230 --> 00:20:40.796 demonstrate that you're going to be able to recruit some people into the 00:20:40.829 --> 00:20:48.829 program. 00:20:49.240 --> 00:20:54.407 Talk a little bit about them how how the College of Business grew when you 00:20:54.440 --> 00:20:57.607 came here through the years. 00:20:57.640 --> 00:21:02.697 Well I think we grew more than we ever intended to. The fact is that by 00:21:02.730 --> 00:21:08.717 1980 or so this college of business here was numerically in terms of not 00:21:08.750 --> 00:21:13.667 full time equivalent students, but actual total student body, one of the 00:21:13.700 --> 00:21:18.016 two or three largest colleges of business in the US. That's not what we 00:21:18.049 --> 00:21:24.167 set out to do. But it happened of course we were in a tremendously growing 00:21:24.200 --> 00:21:28.586 population area here metro and we were getting a lot of out of state 00:21:28.619 --> 00:21:34.816 students because the reputation of the school had been so enhanced by 00:21:34.849 --> 00:21:40.177 events that we became an attractive destination for a lot of these 00:21:40.210 --> 00:21:44.937 students. So there was a lot of growth. I think though I'd rather 00:21:44.970 --> 00:21:50.147 emphasize the fact that we improved the quality of what we offered and we 00:21:50.180 --> 00:21:54.607 were constantly working on that, improving the curriculum. I can remember 00:21:54.640 --> 00:22:02.086 going way back for a moment to 1960. Glenn asked me to chair the 00:22:02.119 --> 00:22:06.976 curriculum committee in the college and the major goal I had there was in 00:22:07.009 --> 00:22:12.486 view of our impending accreditation to have a program that we could truly 00:22:12.519 --> 00:22:16.756 be proud of because at that time colleges and business were being 00:22:16.789 --> 00:22:22.496 criticized and fairly so for being too much of a trade school and too 00:22:22.529 --> 00:22:29.357 little real education if I may put it that way. And so we constructed a 00:22:29.390 --> 00:22:34.746 curriculum at that time which was somewhat innovative in which we required 00:22:34.779 --> 00:22:42.066 all business students to do no less than 45% of their work in general 00:22:42.099 --> 00:22:44.506 Studies 00:22:44.539 --> 00:22:49.986 and then another 45% in business courses with the remaining 10% free 00:22:50.019 --> 00:22:55.286 electives And that was I think a notable event and one of the things that 00:22:55.319 --> 00:23:02.026 made our application for accreditation more credible because the trend in 00:23:02.059 --> 00:23:06.887 those days was correctly, in my view toward more of a liberal education 00:23:06.920 --> 00:23:13.907 along with the specialized education. 00:23:13.940 --> 00:23:18.207 It seems like today the emphasis is a lot on getting the M. B. A. The 00:23:18.240 --> 00:23:22.347 master. That's true. Did that happen back in those days? But at the time I 00:23:22.380 --> 00:23:26.586 came here we did not have an M. B. A. We had a master of science and 00:23:26.619 --> 00:23:31.607 accounting and a master of science in business administration. 00:23:31.640 --> 00:23:38.006 We did then adopt an NBA later on and dropped that M. S. In in business 00:23:38.039 --> 00:23:40.107 administration. 00:23:40.140 --> 00:23:44.316 But no there was not anywhere near as much emphasis on the graduate side 00:23:44.349 --> 00:23:50.877 at that time we were essentially an undergraduate school with a small 00:23:50.910 --> 00:23:55.336 graduate program. So at that time were you turning out more people that 00:23:55.369 --> 00:23:59.697 were going to become C. P. A. S or what what was the goal? Well of course 00:23:59.730 --> 00:24:02.766 there are quite a few different specialties as you know within the college 00:24:02.799 --> 00:24:08.056 of business. Accounting was a very popular major at that time. But then so 00:24:08.089 --> 00:24:15.296 it's marketing and so it was management, so was finance? Uh No, I I don't 00:24:15.329 --> 00:24:18.816 think the balance there was particularly different perhaps from what it is 00:24:18.849 --> 00:24:26.849 now, there were just a lot more students in the later stages, 00:24:27.359 --> 00:24:32.197 how did the college as it grew in size? I imagine that you had to get new 00:24:32.230 --> 00:24:35.506 building or move out of? 00:24:35.539 --> 00:24:42.957 Well, again, it was a matter of getting money, always the big problem and 00:24:42.990 --> 00:24:48.207 planning the building. So when we were quite certain we were going to find 00:24:48.240 --> 00:24:53.207 the money which came from a range of sources, frankly, some of it from the 00:24:53.240 --> 00:24:57.967 legislature, some of it from other sources, 00:24:58.000 --> 00:25:03.316 we constituted building committee and uh Glenn again said Bill, will you 00:25:03.349 --> 00:25:08.147 chair of the building committee? So naturally, I said yes, so we planned 00:25:08.180 --> 00:25:12.526 the new building knowing full well that they've given the dollars we had, 00:25:12.559 --> 00:25:15.476 we would end up with a building that was inadequate in terms of its 00:25:15.509 --> 00:25:20.486 capacity. But then we thought, well design it in such a way that we can 00:25:20.519 --> 00:25:25.887 add to it conveniently in a few years. So we designed this building which 00:25:25.920 --> 00:25:31.867 was, I wouldn't say unique, but it was unusual for its time in the sense 00:25:31.900 --> 00:25:35.826 that most of the classrooms were built on multiple levels, you know, kind 00:25:35.859 --> 00:25:40.296 of a case study rather than the old fashioned flat on with a professor up 00:25:40.329 --> 00:25:45.286 on a platform and this will prove to be of course, an absolutely brilliant 00:25:45.319 --> 00:25:50.276 move because it made professors more effective. It brought about more 00:25:50.309 --> 00:25:53.526 participation in the classroom. And I think that was one of our great 00:25:53.559 --> 00:25:59.016 motivations and having done this. And then of course, Glenn got the idea 00:25:59.049 --> 00:26:03.177 that he'd get some businesses and so on to provide art for the room. So we 00:26:03.210 --> 00:26:07.377 had a kind of a combination of business and art and our our building 00:26:07.410 --> 00:26:13.246 became quite a, quite a noted building for for those reasons we occupied 00:26:13.279 --> 00:26:16.506 it as I recall in 1968 00:26:16.539 --> 00:26:22.187 by 1971 we already were occupying the addition and even that very soon, of 00:26:22.220 --> 00:26:27.897 course proved to be inadequate. So we had to get classes in other parts of 00:26:27.930 --> 00:26:32.687 the campus because our building was 100% used morning, afternoon and 00:26:32.720 --> 00:26:36.707 evening. 00:26:36.740 --> 00:26:41.326 Was there discussion then about another building? Only at the very end of 00:26:41.359 --> 00:26:46.107 my career, pretty much just about the time that I went back to full time 00:26:46.140 --> 00:26:51.717 teaching, which was 1981 is when the notion of the new building came into 00:26:51.750 --> 00:26:55.066 into effect. And of course that was considered not a substitute building, 00:26:55.099 --> 00:27:00.687 but an additional facility, which it is to this day. Were you part of the 00:27:00.720 --> 00:27:06.657 planning? But the fact is, I was chaired a committee but we came up with a 00:27:06.690 --> 00:27:11.437 plan that was rejected by the top administration. And then it was deferred 00:27:11.470 --> 00:27:16.326 for a while until after Glenn and I both left our positions and went back 00:27:16.359 --> 00:27:19.746 to teaching and another committee came in and designed a totally different 00:27:19.779 --> 00:27:24.137 kind of building, which is what we have today. What would you, what was 00:27:24.170 --> 00:27:28.217 the building you designed? We wanted to be integrated as right as a part 00:27:28.250 --> 00:27:32.836 of the existing building and not to be a tower of six story tower. But 00:27:32.869 --> 00:27:37.847 then there are different concepts of what things should be. So what do you 00:27:37.880 --> 00:27:43.306 think of the building as it is today? Well, I guess my major observation, 00:27:43.339 --> 00:27:46.046 there are two things that I would observe about it. First of all our 00:27:46.079 --> 00:27:50.927 philosophy was that the top administrators ought to be accessible and I'm 00:27:50.960 --> 00:27:55.637 not saying they're not accessible today, but we deliberately, in our 00:27:55.670 --> 00:27:59.637 original design of our building put the Dean's office and the most 00:27:59.670 --> 00:28:04.006 conspicuous, most easily approached place anywhere in the building, right 00:28:04.039 --> 00:28:08.607 on the first floor off the patio and a lot of students and faculty came in 00:28:08.640 --> 00:28:13.826 a lot. And now of course the Dean's office and it's complex is on the top 00:28:13.859 --> 00:28:18.776 story, the story of the six story tower. And you know, to me that there's 00:28:18.809 --> 00:28:23.066 a different message, but I'm not criticizing. I'm merely saying we have 00:28:23.099 --> 00:28:26.407 different philosophies apparently about this kind of thing. The other 00:28:26.440 --> 00:28:31.006 thing is that a new philosophy came into effect about the size of classes. 00:28:31.039 --> 00:28:37.707 We had pretty stringent rules about maximum size on classes and we 00:28:37.740 --> 00:28:44.137 avoided any kinds of big lecture hall sections. We didn't like these two 00:28:44.170 --> 00:28:49.046 and 300 student sections, but they built those in of course to the new 00:28:49.079 --> 00:28:53.486 building because of a different philosophy. So how large were the classes 00:28:53.519 --> 00:28:59.566 back when you're ready? There were, there was one originally one bill 00:28:59.599 --> 00:29:02.976 classroom in the, in the building and then subsequently on the addition, 00:29:03.009 --> 00:29:07.526 the second one in which it was possible to have classes of about 100 but 00:29:07.559 --> 00:29:12.306 we would use only the introduction to business class. We put that in that 00:29:12.339 --> 00:29:17.006 room. Most of the other classes were pretty much in the 40 range, 00:29:17.039 --> 00:29:21.506 occasionally a little more someone. 00:29:21.539 --> 00:29:26.246 What sort of classes did you teach when I thought such a range of classes 00:29:26.279 --> 00:29:30.657 that it's hard to remember them all starting with elementary accounting. 00:29:30.690 --> 00:29:35.407 And then when we got our doctoral program, the first doctoral seminar for 00:29:35.440 --> 00:29:39.746 accounting specialists and a different doctoral seminar for non accounting 00:29:39.779 --> 00:29:45.397 doctoral students. Um I taught governmental accounting, I taught advanced 00:29:45.430 --> 00:29:51.006 accounting consolidations. 00:29:51.039 --> 00:29:57.667 I taught master's programs, case study. I even one time caught. Yeah, I 00:29:57.700 --> 00:30:03.026 taught a course in the College of Education, Accounting for educational 00:30:03.059 --> 00:30:05.306 administrators, 00:30:05.339 --> 00:30:09.607 which was an interesting experience and they do do a lot of accounting and 00:30:09.640 --> 00:30:15.867 huge budget now. Okay, looking back on your career, is there anything 00:30:15.900 --> 00:30:19.476 particular that stands out to you that you're particularly proud of or was 00:30:19.509 --> 00:30:22.107 particularly interesting? 00:30:22.140 --> 00:30:25.847 Well, I think if I'm going to be proud of anything of what I did, I think 00:30:25.880 --> 00:30:30.107 it's my caring for students. 00:30:30.140 --> 00:30:33.907 I think it was a good administrator because I had a lot of experience in 00:30:33.940 --> 00:30:38.167 administration before I came here and I think Glenn recognized that, but 00:30:38.200 --> 00:30:43.377 still to me being an educator is educating and it's the close 00:30:43.410 --> 00:30:46.826 relationships you have with your students and the effect you might have on 00:30:46.859 --> 00:30:51.726 them, not only in teaching them the subject matter, but in affecting their 00:30:51.759 --> 00:30:57.177 view of life, maybe having a little bit to do with the kinds of values by 00:30:57.210 --> 00:31:00.996 which they live. I think that's the responsibility of an educator and I 00:31:01.029 --> 00:31:07.407 think I was pretty successful at that. Which is, can be, can be pretty 00:31:07.440 --> 00:31:11.226 much supported by some of the events that have occurred involving some of 00:31:11.259 --> 00:31:16.836 those former students since then. Can you give us some examples? Oh, I 00:31:16.869 --> 00:31:20.786 suppose the outstanding example would be a student I had in the late 00:31:20.819 --> 00:31:25.627 sixties who I helped them get into stanford to get his MBA and who became 00:31:25.660 --> 00:31:31.996 a pioneer in Silicon Valley as a venture capitalist and became an 00:31:32.029 --> 00:31:36.816 extremely successful venture capitalist who, something like four years ago 00:31:36.849 --> 00:31:44.849 , three years ago suddenly called in and said, well it's time for payback. 00:31:45.140 --> 00:31:53.140 So he funded scholarships in my name at the issue with a gift of about 00:31:53.180 --> 00:31:56.306 $1.2 million. 00:31:56.339 --> 00:32:01.697 I think that's kind of an indication of of having had a relationship with 00:32:01.730 --> 00:32:09.086 a student that really mattered. Pretty wonderful gift. Mhm. Um can you 00:32:09.119 --> 00:32:14.887 tell us his name? His name is john Mumford. He's now pretty much left the 00:32:14.920 --> 00:32:18.056 venture capital game partly I think because there's not much venture 00:32:18.089 --> 00:32:23.246 capital going on in these days, but also because john is after all 00:32:23.279 --> 00:32:26.377 reaching the age in which he's ready to retire and he has plenty of 00:32:26.410 --> 00:32:30.597 resources to retire on 00:32:30.630 --> 00:32:33.496 probably because of you that he was willing to put something back here? 00:32:33.529 --> 00:32:38.726 Well that's true, that's absolutely true. Those scholarships are being 00:32:38.759 --> 00:32:42.816 awarded every year of course. And a little sideline on that. He said, well 00:32:42.849 --> 00:32:45.836 it's for you. I want them to your name. And I said john there ain't gonna 00:32:45.869 --> 00:32:50.056 be no scholarships unless your names on them too. So they now have both of 00:32:50.089 --> 00:32:55.457 our names on them. Are you involved in choosing? No. That's done by people 00:32:55.490 --> 00:32:58.357 within the school of accountancy. They have a committee that's appointed 00:32:58.390 --> 00:33:04.607 for that. Can you think of any other notable students? 00:33:04.640 --> 00:33:10.687 Quite a few. Well one very notable student. I might as well name names 00:33:10.720 --> 00:33:16.687 while we're about it I guess would be Tony historica who came here from 00:33:16.720 --> 00:33:21.617 Superior. Arizona became an honor student in accounting, went into public 00:33:21.650 --> 00:33:25.236 accounting. But for the last quite a number of years have been like number 00:33:25.269 --> 00:33:29.806 two men at blue cross blue shield Arizona right there with bob bullock. 00:33:29.839 --> 00:33:33.867 Everybody knows bob. Of course, another one of our distinguished 00:33:33.900 --> 00:33:39.407 graduates. Ah Probably another student I'd mentioned from that same era in 00:33:39.440 --> 00:33:45.016 the late sixties Craig Weatherup who became the Ceo of Pepsico and he's 00:33:45.049 --> 00:33:50.736 now retired here back in the valley. Yet another one bob short again from 00:33:50.769 --> 00:33:55.907 the late sixties. That must have been a particularly good period I guess. 00:33:55.940 --> 00:34:01.006 He ended up in Denver as a believe it or not, a real estate development 00:34:01.039 --> 00:34:05.256 person and again, extremely successful. Retired now in montecito 00:34:05.289 --> 00:34:11.637 California. Just as a few examples but many more do you keep up personal 00:34:11.670 --> 00:34:15.606 relationships with some of them? Absolutely, 00:34:15.639 --> 00:34:20.606 Absolutely. Contact with them fairly frequently. 00:34:20.639 --> 00:34:23.807 Great. 00:34:23.840 --> 00:34:26.597 We'll talk a little bit more about how the university changed over those 00:34:26.630 --> 00:34:32.367 years. We talked about Homer Duro, what about some of the other when he 00:34:32.400 --> 00:34:35.787 left some of the other presidents because he was followed by Harry, New 00:34:35.820 --> 00:34:40.936 Bern and Harry had come here in the College of Education. He had been a 00:34:40.969 --> 00:34:45.506 president of some other institution. I can't remember where at the moment 00:34:45.539 --> 00:34:51.327 he became acting president when Ji Homer Durham went back to Utah, he was 00:34:51.360 --> 00:34:55.236 acting president for one year and during that year a search for a new 00:34:55.269 --> 00:34:59.606 president was unsuccessful. 00:34:59.639 --> 00:35:03.747 So then they put her in and inaugurate him, installed him. And you know, 00:35:03.780 --> 00:35:09.407 we went through all of the activities that that entails. Harry was more or 00:35:09.440 --> 00:35:15.767 less of a caretaker and rightly so. Uh and then of course he was followed 00:35:15.800 --> 00:35:22.686 by john Suara and he by Russ nelson, which as far as I go with the, with 00:35:22.719 --> 00:35:30.436 the president's. Um these were honorable men, all of them. But of course I 00:35:30.469 --> 00:35:35.657 always come back to Jihad or as being the epitome of what a president 00:35:35.690 --> 00:35:39.706 ought to be. But these other people did some great things for the, for the 00:35:39.739 --> 00:35:45.006 institution. There's no question about that, but each had his own style. 00:35:45.039 --> 00:35:50.907 Each had his own vision and 00:35:50.940 --> 00:35:56.037 throughout it all the institution I failed to while it grew to what it is 00:35:56.070 --> 00:35:59.816 today and probably what the second or third largest university in the 00:35:59.849 --> 00:36:07.849 country, ah public university because I, I'm recognized at the university 00:36:08.780 --> 00:36:12.247 of phoenix. If you figure all the people they have online and far exceeds 00:36:12.280 --> 00:36:19.137 what the issue has. Uh but it, I think more important was the stature and 00:36:19.170 --> 00:36:22.876 the recognition because when you look at a lot of our programs today and I 00:36:22.909 --> 00:36:27.657 know best those in the college of Business. Of course, we have attained 00:36:27.690 --> 00:36:31.617 some real national stature and recognition when you have programs that are 00:36:31.650 --> 00:36:35.217 recognized in the top 25 in the country. I think that's, that's rather 00:36:35.250 --> 00:36:39.557 notable and to me that's a much greater attainment than being the third 00:36:39.590 --> 00:36:43.986 largest university in the US. 00:36:44.019 --> 00:36:47.427 Did you ever think it would get so large? Never, never would have dreamed 00:36:47.460 --> 00:36:52.717 it, but then I think neither did anyone else, even though you, you looked 00:36:52.750 --> 00:36:56.717 at all of the data that might have been analyzed in anticipation would 00:36:56.750 --> 00:37:00.916 never have anticipated that there would be such an influx of people who 00:37:00.949 --> 00:37:05.206 historically had not been getting a university education and I think that 00:37:05.239 --> 00:37:09.497 has made a tremendous difference here. 00:37:09.530 --> 00:37:14.497 And what about the growth of phoenix? Well, that of course is again 00:37:14.530 --> 00:37:18.447 astronomical. I mean, it's hard to believe I came here partly to get away 00:37:18.480 --> 00:37:23.126 from the big city in Denver? Yeah. Now, of course phoenix, Metro is 00:37:23.159 --> 00:37:29.896 considerably bigger than Metro Denver, but who can foresee these things, 00:37:29.929 --> 00:37:37.597 but we, we adjust, we developed, we work when we grow. Do you think that's 00:37:37.630 --> 00:37:41.756 a good thing? That it's a mixed blessing? Of course, I mean the quality of 00:37:41.789 --> 00:37:46.907 life to some extent has suffered I think happily of course many of us are 00:37:46.940 --> 00:37:54.416 spared having to drive in the rush hour traffic, but we've had advantages 00:37:54.449 --> 00:37:58.307 out of it. We have arts, wonderful arts programs here in the metro area 00:37:58.340 --> 00:38:02.267 that we could not have had were not a major, major place. So no, there 00:38:02.300 --> 00:38:08.287 there there it's a mixed blessing always. 00:38:08.320 --> 00:38:13.686 I could get a little bit more about as you and the growth here. Um 00:38:13.719 --> 00:38:16.956 do you see it as a different kind of place? I mean you've been retired for 00:38:16.989 --> 00:38:22.626 quite a while now. Um Well of course a lot of the growth happened even 00:38:22.659 --> 00:38:26.376 before I retired. It has continued to grow, It's true, but even by the 00:38:26.409 --> 00:38:31.206 time I retired we had of course lost a lot of the intimacy that we had 00:38:31.239 --> 00:38:34.387 early on, the camaraderie, 00:38:34.420 --> 00:38:42.026 ah it just became too big and anymore I would, from what I can tell, I 00:38:42.059 --> 00:38:48.887 feel that not only do most faculty members not know people of very many of 00:38:48.920 --> 00:38:53.506 their colleagues across the university, I think many of them don't know 00:38:53.539 --> 00:38:58.307 very many of their colleagues within their own college and possibly in 00:38:58.340 --> 00:39:02.617 some cases, maybe not all the people within their own department, it's 00:39:02.650 --> 00:39:06.517 become that kind of place because of this tremendous growth. And and for 00:39:06.550 --> 00:39:13.686 one other factor, there has been a substantial shift in the emphasis of 00:39:13.719 --> 00:39:18.256 what's expected of faculty and maybe I could hold for us on that for just 00:39:18.289 --> 00:39:23.117 a moment, certainly in the College of business, back in my days there and 00:39:23.150 --> 00:39:28.566 with Glenn Overman, when we were of one mind in this matter, we believe 00:39:28.599 --> 00:39:34.217 that a college had the obligation to do outstanding teaching, to do some 00:39:34.250 --> 00:39:39.387 research and publications and to do service both internally and externally. 00:39:39.420 --> 00:39:44.807 And of course that's, everybody says that, however, how you apply it 00:39:44.840 --> 00:39:48.506 makes a difference. And our philosophy on that was first of all that we 00:39:48.539 --> 00:39:53.657 didn't expect that every person who came to join our faculty was going to 00:39:53.690 --> 00:39:58.677 excel in everything. It simply isn't in the cards. And so our philosophy 00:39:58.710 --> 00:40:04.137 was, let's hire someone who excels at least in something and is adequate 00:40:04.170 --> 00:40:10.186 and the others on the theory, again that a college or a department or a 00:40:10.219 --> 00:40:18.219 university can do very well in all of those three areas. Without each 00:40:18.809 --> 00:40:23.677 individual participating equally in the areas. 00:40:23.710 --> 00:40:27.267 In other words, we're saying, let's concentrate on the strengths and 00:40:27.300 --> 00:40:31.666 interests of each individual and the totality of what we get out of the 00:40:31.699 --> 00:40:35.736 group of people will be quite satisfactory. 00:40:35.769 --> 00:40:40.057 That was really our philosophy, I have the feeling and I'm glad to be 00:40:40.090 --> 00:40:44.497 proven wrong on this one. I have the feeling that the emphasis has shifted 00:40:44.530 --> 00:40:50.206 considerably to where each individual on the faculty is now expected to be 00:40:50.239 --> 00:40:54.706 extremely successful and with a greater emphasis on research and 00:40:54.739 --> 00:40:59.097 publications. In fact if you don't pretty much excel in that in publishing 00:40:59.130 --> 00:41:03.177 the right journals and so on, you're probably history and that's that is 00:41:03.210 --> 00:41:08.177 the change. And this was of course not that we didn't treasure good 00:41:08.210 --> 00:41:12.077 research and publication and indeed we have quite a few faculty who were 00:41:12.110 --> 00:41:17.177 nationally and internationally famous even many years ago, but more of a 00:41:17.210 --> 00:41:21.907 concept that it's the totality of what you get rather than looking at each 00:41:21.940 --> 00:41:28.157 individual that really matters. That's a different philosophy about the 00:41:28.190 --> 00:41:32.477 whole field of accounting and business. Um It seems like there's been some 00:41:32.510 --> 00:41:36.657 changes at least in the last decade or so with everything going to 00:41:36.690 --> 00:41:41.876 computers? Oh yeah, it's a totally different world. I'm glad I'm out of it 00:41:41.909 --> 00:41:49.477 because back in my days, you know the the high tech stuff was punch cards 00:41:49.510 --> 00:41:56.157 and I never got into that, even I'm simply not a high tech type. But yes 00:41:56.190 --> 00:41:59.947 it has changed dramatically, especially looking at the field of accounting 00:41:59.980 --> 00:42:03.967 has changed even more dramatically in the last three years thanks to 00:42:04.000 --> 00:42:07.626 things like Enron and the loss of Arthur Andersen and that kind of thing 00:42:07.659 --> 00:42:14.276 and we've really faced a crisis here of credibility, of integrity within 00:42:14.309 --> 00:42:17.706 that profession? Can you talk a little bit about that. Did you ever think 00:42:17.739 --> 00:42:23.666 you'd see Arthur Andersen? Well I had great pride in being in a C. P. A. 00:42:23.699 --> 00:42:28.006 And being a part of that profession and I was always the one who felt that 00:42:28.039 --> 00:42:32.977 we did an extraordinarily good job of maintaining integrity of having high 00:42:33.010 --> 00:42:38.267 standards and we did a lot of self policing. 00:42:38.300 --> 00:42:41.936 But what's happened in our world today and I'm afraid it's part of our 00:42:41.969 --> 00:42:47.637 total society really is that we've come to the point that we we don't 00:42:47.670 --> 00:42:52.287 really worry much about standards and values and integrity as much as we 00:42:52.320 --> 00:42:59.327 once did broadly speaking and everything is the buck. It's it's how many 00:42:59.360 --> 00:43:04.646 dollars can I get out of this thing? And when you get corporate officers, 00:43:04.679 --> 00:43:09.586 top officers whose goal is not to look after the stockholders and the 00:43:09.619 --> 00:43:13.526 employees and all those people, but rather look after their own bank 00:43:13.559 --> 00:43:18.436 account and they will do almost anything to feather their own nest. We've 00:43:18.469 --> 00:43:25.967 got a serious problem. And when the accounting profession is either 00:43:26.000 --> 00:43:30.236 knowingly or unknowingly permitting that sort of thing to happen, we 00:43:30.269 --> 00:43:34.166 deservedly are going to be criticized. 00:43:34.199 --> 00:43:37.597 And of course the epitome of what happened, what can happen is as you say 00:43:37.630 --> 00:43:42.896 Arthur Andersen, I know I never would have dreamed that one of the major 00:43:42.929 --> 00:43:48.537 accounting firms would be so involved and would be so foolish as try to 00:43:48.570 --> 00:43:53.236 cover up something that obviously was wrong. All they had to do was look 00:43:53.269 --> 00:43:57.467 at Richard Nixon to find out what happens when you try to stonewall you 00:43:57.500 --> 00:44:02.497 get caught and they got caught and they deserved what they got in my view 00:44:02.530 --> 00:44:09.157 . I hope it's a lesson to the other big firms. 00:44:09.190 --> 00:44:17.190 Ask a question. Sure. Um what was ethics taught as as a subject? 00:44:17.590 --> 00:44:22.267 Yeah, Yeah. Talk a little bit about, did you teach ethics when you were 00:44:22.300 --> 00:44:26.557 teaching accounting? Did we? The answer to that is that we did not really 00:44:26.590 --> 00:44:31.986 have a separate ethics course that would require students to take. I'm not 00:44:32.019 --> 00:44:35.316 sure that that's the right way to teach ethics. First of all, I happen to 00:44:35.349 --> 00:44:40.657 believe that values and ethics and so on. Start very early in life. I 00:44:40.690 --> 00:44:46.017 don't think they started at the university. They start in the family in 00:44:46.050 --> 00:44:50.586 early schooling, in churches where people are church members, that's where 00:44:50.619 --> 00:44:54.376 it ought to be. And then if it's enhanced when one gets to the university 00:44:54.409 --> 00:44:58.827 , I think it's best done right in individual courses. I taught ethics and 00:44:58.860 --> 00:45:03.376 accounting courses and I think you can teach something about values and 00:45:03.409 --> 00:45:08.816 standards, no matter what you're teaching. So while I don't denigrate the 00:45:08.849 --> 00:45:12.057 notion of having ethics courses, because we're doing that in my profession 00:45:12.090 --> 00:45:16.347 , we're doing that Marianne Jennings is doing a lot of that of course in 00:45:16.380 --> 00:45:22.057 the College of Business and I think it may help, it certainly can't hurt. 00:45:22.090 --> 00:45:25.106 But still, I don't think it's a solution to the problem of, of having 00:45:25.139 --> 00:45:29.657 high standards and values? 00:45:29.690 --> 00:45:33.456 I wish it were that simple. 00:45:33.489 --> 00:45:37.717 What sort of advice do you give to people today that are considering going 00:45:37.750 --> 00:45:43.057 into business and accounting? 00:45:43.090 --> 00:45:47.977 Well I guess I don't have much occasion today to talk to very many people 00:45:48.010 --> 00:45:52.106 who are doing that for starters. So it's more more like a hypothetical 00:45:52.139 --> 00:45:56.776 question of what would I say to them? Well for starters, let's be specific 00:45:56.809 --> 00:45:59.626 about accounting. I'm not quite certain that I would urge a lot of 00:45:59.659 --> 00:46:05.146 students to go into accounting today until they get their house in order. 00:46:05.179 --> 00:46:08.197 On the other hand, I think it's fair to say that while there's been a lot 00:46:08.230 --> 00:46:12.916 of publicity about a few and this always happens. Of course you get the 00:46:12.949 --> 00:46:18.776 few bad apples and it sort of taints the whole barrel. And I think that 00:46:18.809 --> 00:46:23.677 the standards and values that most accounting firms are are living by 00:46:23.710 --> 00:46:28.086 today, especially with the smaller firms with smaller clients are every 00:46:28.119 --> 00:46:32.336 bit as good as they've ever been. But it's the big firms that somehow have 00:46:32.369 --> 00:46:36.747 lost their way along with 00:46:36.780 --> 00:46:43.276 not only the firms, the business leadership, the stock market people, the 00:46:43.309 --> 00:46:47.986 brokerage houses, they've all lost their way and each one feeds on the 00:46:48.019 --> 00:46:53.847 other and then it becomes synergistic after a while, it all becomes part 00:46:53.880 --> 00:46:59.537 of a pattern. So no, I wouldn't steer people away particularly from it, 00:46:59.570 --> 00:47:03.327 but I think they ought to go in with their eyes open because they can go 00:47:03.360 --> 00:47:09.436 in sometimes too idealistic and and then they're going to be damaged. Do 00:47:09.469 --> 00:47:12.736 you think you can be too idealistic? I'm sorry, you can't be too 00:47:12.769 --> 00:47:17.586 idealistic. No, I don't think it can be too idealistic. But uh I mean 00:47:17.619 --> 00:47:21.956 idealistic with stars in your eyes and and without looking at the 00:47:21.989 --> 00:47:26.206 realities, I think there's a danger of that. Do you think a lot of people 00:47:26.239 --> 00:47:29.986 today go into business and go to school for business thinking that that's 00:47:30.019 --> 00:47:33.046 how they're going to make their fortune? 00:47:33.079 --> 00:47:37.407 Of course they do. And there's way too much emphasis on that as though the 00:47:37.440 --> 00:47:42.086 sole goal in life is to see who dies richest. That seems to be kind of the 00:47:42.119 --> 00:47:47.046 goal today too much way too much. 00:47:47.079 --> 00:47:52.146 We need some values and we need to return to a system of values. If that's 00:47:52.179 --> 00:47:58.086 possible. It seems like you certainly didn't by changing from being a 00:47:58.119 --> 00:48:03.146 business owner to an educator. Your goal wasn't to die the richest. On the 00:48:03.179 --> 00:48:08.827 contrary, I probably could have died a lot of richer than I will if I had 00:48:08.860 --> 00:48:12.876 not made the move. There's no question about that. But there are values in 00:48:12.909 --> 00:48:16.537 life, as I say, that transcend 00:48:16.570 --> 00:48:21.566 making a lot of money. It's it's it's like everything else in life. How 00:48:21.599 --> 00:48:27.727 much is enough then you should say there are other things you want to do. 00:48:27.760 --> 00:48:32.137 And so that's the way I live my life? 00:48:32.170 --> 00:48:34.827 Mhm. 00:48:34.860 --> 00:48:37.776 I think I've answered most of the questions I had for you. Is there 00:48:37.809 --> 00:48:40.617 anything you came here thinking you wanted to tell us that I didn't ask 00:48:40.650 --> 00:48:44.677 you? Well, I don't know if you're at all interested in what kind of things 00:48:44.710 --> 00:48:50.566 I've done since I retired. That might be an interesting question. I'll be 00:48:50.599 --> 00:48:55.646 an interviewer myself. You're well, I didn't come very involved out in the 00:48:55.679 --> 00:48:59.017 community, which I didn't have time to do as I think you can detect from 00:48:59.050 --> 00:49:04.126 my earlier story. So among my love, my first love is the is the Botanical 00:49:04.159 --> 00:49:09.497 Garden where I've been on the board for most of the last 15 years and I 00:49:09.530 --> 00:49:15.307 have served them as treasurer and as president of the board, Treasurer of 00:49:15.340 --> 00:49:21.497 the $17 million capital campaign not so long ago. And, and in a wide range 00:49:21.530 --> 00:49:25.657 of other activities, special projects of one kind and another. So that's 00:49:25.690 --> 00:49:31.026 been one of my first loves, my first love. But secondarily I'm on the 00:49:31.059 --> 00:49:35.727 board at Ballet Arizona where I'm also on the finance committee. We always 00:49:35.760 --> 00:49:39.907 get put on the finance committee, you know how that was. And doing some 00:49:39.940 --> 00:49:45.626 other special projects task forces of one kind and another. And then a 00:49:45.659 --> 00:49:51.336 range of other things. A committee of the state board of accountancy eh 00:49:51.369 --> 00:49:57.537 committee of the Arizona Society of CPAs Rose Garden Task force at Mesa 00:49:57.570 --> 00:50:01.407 Community College. And I've been asked recently to start working with them 00:50:01.440 --> 00:50:07.876 on the arboretum at CSU East. Uh and a few other little things keep your 00:50:07.909 --> 00:50:12.916 hand in. Well, you know, it's, I'm not one of those people who says I'm 00:50:12.949 --> 00:50:19.467 busy or known when I worked. I no, no, no, no, I'm only a fractionally as 00:50:19.500 --> 00:50:24.387 busy, fractionally as busy as I was then. But uh first of all I don't, I 00:50:24.420 --> 00:50:27.666 don't like to sit around and wait for something to happen. I prefer to be 00:50:27.699 --> 00:50:31.977 one of the people who helped make things happen. And so I do these things 00:50:32.010 --> 00:50:37.986 , it's gratifying, you can have a sense of, of having contributed 00:50:38.019 --> 00:50:43.767 something and I want to go right down to the last day if I can doing that 00:50:43.800 --> 00:50:50.077 sort of thing. Great. Did either of you have some questions that you 00:50:50.110 --> 00:50:56.546 covered a lot of territory? Thank you. Bill did it in an hour to just a 00:50:56.579 --> 00:51:00.427 word maybe about when you came to Tempe. It was small. You might talk 00:51:00.460 --> 00:51:04.086 about how it grew, where did you live? And have you moved since you still 00:51:04.119 --> 00:51:10.997 live in Tempe? Um let me talk to me about that. Um when I first came here 00:51:11.030 --> 00:51:18.486 , being a person who, my being 00:51:18.519 --> 00:51:23.867 a person who doesn't want to make uh irrevocable commitments and then wish 00:51:23.900 --> 00:51:31.900 you had not done. So I rented a place for the first year, but by before 00:51:32.769 --> 00:51:37.427 new Year I decided that yeah, I'm gonna stay here. So I had a custom house 00:51:37.460 --> 00:51:41.767 building Tempe on concorde a drive, which was a place where you can get 00:51:41.800 --> 00:51:45.986 rather large lots and build custom homes. And then I lived there for the 00:51:46.019 --> 00:51:51.367 next 25 years until 1981 when I retired. And at that time since my wife 00:51:51.400 --> 00:51:59.400 and I are really travelers and have been travelers all over the world. I 00:51:59.420 --> 00:52:03.566 decided I wanted something with a little more of security, a little more 00:52:03.599 --> 00:52:08.566 ease of walking away from not worrying. So I moved into a condo in 00:52:08.599 --> 00:52:12.517 Scottsdale and have been there ever since. 00:52:12.550 --> 00:52:16.227 It sounds like you like gardening and plants. So that must be. Well, I 00:52:16.260 --> 00:52:19.767 also am a farmer out at the community garden at Scottsdale Community 00:52:19.800 --> 00:52:24.526 College where I am currently growing some very nice crops. So you don't 00:52:24.559 --> 00:52:27.006 have to have it in your own backyard and I can't have it in my own 00:52:27.039 --> 00:52:30.206 backyard at the condo. 00:52:30.239 --> 00:52:34.217 That's great. Does that go back to your roots of 00:52:34.250 --> 00:52:41.447 my father loved gardening and so actually we boys got involved 00:52:41.480 --> 00:52:47.816 sometimes unwillingly but nevertheless we got involved. 00:52:47.849 --> 00:52:50.666 I'd love to talk with you more about the desert botanical garden sometimes 00:52:50.699 --> 00:52:56.867 too. That's one of my loves, I forgot to mention to you that I we were 00:52:56.900 --> 00:53:02.497 between the executive directors 2.5 years ago. And so I was interim 00:53:02.530 --> 00:53:07.517 executive director there for four months and I now our executive director 00:53:07.550 --> 00:53:11.276 is going to be going on a two month sabbatical next year. So he's already 00:53:11.309 --> 00:53:14.997 relying me up to take over for that two month period. So I have a lot of 00:53:15.030 --> 00:53:20.907 fun and keep very busy busy enough. Very good. Alright. I think unless you 00:53:20.940 --> 00:53:23.789 have anything else you wanted to.