WEBVTT 00:00:00.140 --> 00:00:05.717 I'm pam Stevenson and um we're doing a oral history interview for the 00:00:05.750 --> 00:00:09.806 living history video project for Arizona State University retirees 00:00:09.839 --> 00:00:16.197 association today is october the 23rd of 2000 and three at the visitor 00:00:16.230 --> 00:00:22.556 center at issue and I'll let you introduce yourself and give me your name 00:00:22.589 --> 00:00:26.227 and tell me what you were doing when you retired from the issue when I 00:00:26.260 --> 00:00:30.107 retired. And then we'll go back and talk about how you got started 00:00:30.140 --> 00:00:36.406 Elizabeth Webster. Pep Low, better known as Bonnie and I was born. Do you 00:00:36.439 --> 00:00:41.546 want to know that now? And tell me what was your position, Assistant 00:00:41.579 --> 00:00:46.006 director of the News Bureau. And then we can go back and talk about when 00:00:46.039 --> 00:00:49.917 you were born. And 00:00:49.950 --> 00:00:56.637 I was born in philadelphia pennsylvania in 1918 and I attended a Quaker 00:00:56.670 --> 00:01:01.207 school. I was married in 1937 00:01:01.240 --> 00:01:07.857 And then right after the war in 1945 we headed West and eventually settled 00:01:07.890 --> 00:01:12.007 in the verde valley of Arizona. 00:01:12.040 --> 00:01:17.906 And while we were there I wrote a novel that was published by Zondervan 00:01:17.939 --> 00:01:24.566 and collaborated with my then husband, Ed Pep Low on a cookbook with 00:01:24.599 --> 00:01:30.397 Southwestern recipes in it from the cowbells and a guide to Oak Creek 00:01:30.430 --> 00:01:37.167 Canyon. And we did many, many magazine articles. Tell me why don't you 00:01:37.200 --> 00:01:41.367 back up a little bit and tell me about what brought you out west? My 00:01:41.400 --> 00:01:46.736 husband had asthma and my son had really bad ears and we were living in 00:01:46.769 --> 00:01:51.467 massachusetts and the doctors then said the only thing they could think of 00:01:51.500 --> 00:01:56.406 that would help both of them was to try Arizona. So we just headed west 00:01:56.439 --> 00:02:00.447 not knowing where we were going or what we're gonna do. That must have 00:02:00.480 --> 00:02:05.387 been quite interesting. Quite a track. Yes, we were on the road for six 00:02:05.420 --> 00:02:11.686 weeks. My baby daughter was six weeks old when we left and that's the 00:02:11.719 --> 00:02:17.816 story in itself. The trek out west in the station wagon, We brought my dad 00:02:17.849 --> 00:02:23.656 with us, he was 60 years old. My son was 4.5 and as I say, my daughter was 00:02:23.689 --> 00:02:28.916 six weeks old and we headed west and found, fell in love with Oak Creek 00:02:28.949 --> 00:02:33.367 Canyon and the red rocks. That's why we finally settled there. Had you 00:02:33.400 --> 00:02:38.346 heard about that back east or how did you end up there? My husband was a 00:02:38.379 --> 00:02:44.066 Princeton graduate and he had known kelly fox at Princeton and kell lived 00:02:44.099 --> 00:02:48.487 , he knew lived in Northern Arizona and it was a cattle man and was in the 00:02:48.520 --> 00:02:54.897 legislature. So we kind of, we're gonna look for him and we did run into 00:02:54.930 --> 00:02:59.596 him in phoenix that just happened to meet him on the street and he talked 00:02:59.629 --> 00:03:05.487 us into going up there and seeing the red rocks and we just totally fell 00:03:05.520 --> 00:03:10.036 in love with Arizona. And I've been in love with it ever since. What was 00:03:10.069 --> 00:03:15.506 phoenix like when you came here? What year was that 1945? 00:03:15.539 --> 00:03:20.987 It was much more, much smaller and Tempe was just a quiet little college 00:03:21.020 --> 00:03:27.256 town. He said he ran into him on the street. But we were, we had breakfast 00:03:27.289 --> 00:03:32.816 at one of the restaurants on Central Avenue. And as we came out of the 00:03:32.849 --> 00:03:39.147 restaurant, we started walking down the sidewalk and saw this cattleman 00:03:39.180 --> 00:03:46.506 and a Stetson hat and boots. And it was cal fox just amazing that he would 00:03:46.539 --> 00:03:51.096 be there and we would see him because my husband didn't have his address 00:03:51.129 --> 00:03:55.876 or anything. We were just going to look for him. So you found him? We 00:03:55.909 --> 00:04:01.606 found him. How big was phoenix back then? What was downtown phoenix like? 00:04:01.639 --> 00:04:08.077 Well, it's hard, I can't remember how many what the population was, but it 00:04:08.110 --> 00:04:13.906 was just a whole lot smaller. Um 00:04:13.939 --> 00:04:18.887 Gosh, it's hard to hard to I picture it now the way it is now and it's 00:04:18.920 --> 00:04:23.827 hard to picture it the way it was then downtown was. There were buildings 00:04:23.860 --> 00:04:29.406 and stores and people shop downtown a lot more than. 00:04:29.439 --> 00:04:32.467 And so you just went up to the verde valley. Did you know anybody up there 00:04:32.500 --> 00:04:38.437 ? Where you other than cal fox? That was No, we didn't know anybody. How 00:04:38.470 --> 00:04:42.476 did you find a place to live? What, where was your first home in corn 00:04:42.509 --> 00:04:44.606 ville? 00:04:44.639 --> 00:04:48.007 Okay. And 00:04:48.040 --> 00:04:53.217 We had done some writing already. And when we got out here and settled in 00:04:53.250 --> 00:04:58.656 Corn Ville, we let our editors know where we were. And then we told them 00:04:58.689 --> 00:05:03.116 the phone number where we were, we didn't have a phone in the house was 00:05:03.149 --> 00:05:08.007 Corn Ville one. And of course they couldn't believe that 00:05:08.040 --> 00:05:13.656 what kind of writing had you done before articles and that sort of thing. 00:05:13.689 --> 00:05:18.296 And as I say I had written a novel and we did, we did four short 00:05:18.329 --> 00:05:25.267 commercial movies for Chevrolet, we scripted them and went in Tucson one 00:05:25.300 --> 00:05:31.906 in cedar breaks, Utah and two in colorado at Aspen and colorado springs 00:05:31.939 --> 00:05:38.406 and worked for the very independent up there was a newspaper in Cottonwood 00:05:38.439 --> 00:05:41.507 before we moved to phoenix. 00:05:41.540 --> 00:05:45.806 So but you say you have been a writer back east before you came here and 00:05:45.839 --> 00:05:48.577 what kind of writing did you do back there? Well, my husband was in 00:05:48.610 --> 00:05:55.377 advertising actually and I had just just written poetry and short stories 00:05:55.410 --> 00:05:59.046 and that sort of thing. So how are you going to make a living when you 00:05:59.079 --> 00:06:07.079 came out here writing? And actually that's what we did, I think of it now 00:06:07.269 --> 00:06:11.846 and I would have never had the nerve to do something like that now, but we 00:06:11.879 --> 00:06:14.877 were young and 00:06:14.910 --> 00:06:19.507 it went well, so you didn't dream of becoming cowboys or having a rant or 00:06:19.540 --> 00:06:23.406 anything, you know? 00:06:23.439 --> 00:06:30.486 So then what brought you finally to phoenix and the issue? Well, um after 00:06:30.519 --> 00:06:35.777 we got to phoenix Maggie Savoy, who was editor of the Arizona Republic 00:06:35.810 --> 00:06:42.337 Women's Page um interviewed me to do a story on my novel and about our 00:06:42.370 --> 00:06:49.536 writing adventures And in 1955 when Joe Spring who was head of the News 00:06:49.569 --> 00:06:54.257 Bureau at Arizona State University needed a writer for his staff. He 00:06:54.290 --> 00:06:59.637 remembered reading Maggie's article. And so he got my phone number from 00:06:59.670 --> 00:07:05.717 her and called up and asked me if I'd like to come to work in the news 00:07:05.750 --> 00:07:13.116 bureau and I said yes And that's how my 30 year career on campus began. 00:07:13.149 --> 00:07:17.996 Well that's how did you get from cornwall to phoenix? Just moved down here 00:07:18.029 --> 00:07:22.637 and bought a house and 00:07:22.670 --> 00:07:29.817 to be more available for writing things. My husband did a history of 00:07:29.850 --> 00:07:36.606 Arizona and some of the people that he was working with were down here. 00:07:36.639 --> 00:07:42.056 So what year did you move to phoenix? 53 I think it was And I went to work 00:07:42.089 --> 00:07:48.647 at issue in 55. Had you worked full time anywhere before? That was a big 00:07:48.680 --> 00:07:52.236 change for you. How come you decided to do that? Well it sounded like an 00:07:52.269 --> 00:07:58.556 exciting job and it was is was what was your first job here? A writer in 00:07:58.589 --> 00:08:04.596 the news bureau And in the beginning um joe Spring hired me to write 00:08:04.629 --> 00:08:11.027 stories that would be of interest to women for the women's pages. Maggie 00:08:11.060 --> 00:08:15.567 Savoy was at the Republic and we we wrote for all the papers and the radio 00:08:15.600 --> 00:08:21.106 stations and television and I interviewed 00:08:21.139 --> 00:08:26.416 faculty women who were interesting, had interesting stories who offered 00:08:26.449 --> 00:08:34.449 interesting programs. Um great damage was president then and I did stories 00:08:35.090 --> 00:08:41.636 the damages every fall had a reception where they greeted and welcomed all 00:08:41.669 --> 00:08:46.817 the new students. And that was a big event in those days. There were only 00:08:46.850 --> 00:08:52.116 about 4500 students. So we knew most of the faculty and a lot of the 00:08:52.149 --> 00:08:59.106 students. And let's see there were things that the, the sororities, the 00:08:59.139 --> 00:09:05.297 papers like to list all the women who are pledged to sororities and that's 00:09:05.330 --> 00:09:11.646 how I started out. But then I quickly quite quickly focus started focusing 00:09:11.679 --> 00:09:17.356 on cultural events And that was my main task, the 30 years that I was 00:09:17.389 --> 00:09:22.297 there. So did you still live in phoenix and commute out to issue. And now 00:09:22.330 --> 00:09:25.986 we moved to Tempe. So we'd be near the university. My husband worked there 00:09:26.019 --> 00:09:28.006 too. 00:09:28.039 --> 00:09:34.047 Mhm. Um Well, tell me about how you mentioned the women faculty. How many 00:09:34.080 --> 00:09:38.266 women faculty? What kind of faculty were women were there? Oh, there were 00:09:38.299 --> 00:09:44.886 a lot of them. Um women in, in education and nursing in home economics, in 00:09:44.919 --> 00:09:52.366 the english department, in physical education department, wives of some of 00:09:52.399 --> 00:09:58.297 the professors. The faculty wives club. Always lots of material to write 00:09:58.330 --> 00:10:01.837 about. Are there any of them that stand out in your mind that were 00:10:01.870 --> 00:10:08.106 particularly interesting? Well, I I just plain enjoyed everybody that I 00:10:08.139 --> 00:10:12.376 interviewed. They were all, especially when I got into the fine arts. They 00:10:12.409 --> 00:10:18.876 were extremely creative and uniquely individual. Each one of them and I 00:10:18.909 --> 00:10:25.697 truly loved working with them. I have a list of people that I have been 00:10:25.730 --> 00:10:30.917 reminiscing about this last week and I listed some of them. So I wouldn't 00:10:30.950 --> 00:10:34.177 forget when I came to talk to you. Well you want to mention some of them 00:10:34.210 --> 00:10:38.037 now. Mhm You need your notes or you want to just tell us about some of 00:10:38.070 --> 00:10:43.927 them. Um, there's so many, I really would do better looking at my notes I 00:10:43.960 --> 00:10:51.960 think on the white paper. Mm hmm. Thank you. Mhm. 00:10:56.679 --> 00:11:01.077 As I said, president damage was, well, tell us a little bit about 00:11:01.110 --> 00:11:06.506 president damage. What was he like? He and his wife were just delightful 00:11:06.539 --> 00:11:12.327 people. They lived on campus in the house that later became alumni house. 00:11:12.360 --> 00:11:20.360 Okay. They had their home was on campus and they, we're very involved in 00:11:21.870 --> 00:11:27.187 all the doings on campuses. I think I mentioned the receptions, they had 00:11:27.220 --> 00:11:34.297 each fall for the new students and Catherine Gamut who is a lovely hostess 00:11:34.330 --> 00:11:38.486 and it was nice that they lived right there on campus. Of course the 00:11:38.519 --> 00:11:43.266 university was a lot smaller than it was Arizona state College. It was not 00:11:43.299 --> 00:11:48.506 yet a university. And so 00:11:48.539 --> 00:11:56.539 the, the events were, the organization was a lot less complex. The, we 00:11:58.590 --> 00:12:05.976 dealt directly with the president's office and the people I remember we're 00:12:06.009 --> 00:12:12.366 Gilbert Katie who is vice president of business Affairs and HD Richie 00:12:12.399 --> 00:12:18.486 Richardson was academic vice president. Um, I remember mary bunty, she 00:12:18.519 --> 00:12:26.519 worked for, she was a secretary in president damages office. Um let's see 00:12:27.440 --> 00:12:34.516 George Morel was in purchasing and al thomas was the registrar, there were 00:12:34.549 --> 00:12:40.886 just so many wonderful people to work with and then when I got into 00:12:40.919 --> 00:12:44.986 covering all the fine arts there was all the music faculty and the art 00:12:45.019 --> 00:12:50.827 faculty, the theater and dance people. Can you tell me anything about? You 00:12:50.860 --> 00:12:55.276 know, you've got a long list of people here in the same music, wow any 00:12:55.309 --> 00:13:01.207 particular ones that stand out that everybody there, I cared a lot about. 00:13:01.240 --> 00:13:05.356 It's hard to pick out just one or 2. It would be interesting if you could 00:13:05.389 --> 00:13:10.287 tell us a story about, you know, one or two of them that you know have 00:13:10.320 --> 00:13:13.707 more than just a list of needs. 00:13:13.740 --> 00:13:21.740 Well let's see um Dave School are, who was in music and worked with the 00:13:22.889 --> 00:13:28.776 vocal groups also was founding director of Gammage Auditorium and he was 00:13:28.809 --> 00:13:34.856 someone that I worked with and admired tremendously before Gammage 00:13:34.889 --> 00:13:41.567 Auditorium was built, we had what was called the Lyceum series and that 00:13:41.600 --> 00:13:48.907 they would bring plays and music and Dave was in charge of that and then 00:13:48.940 --> 00:13:54.886 where they presented them was in the ballroom at the memorial Union and 00:13:54.919 --> 00:14:00.236 that that's where the Lyceum series was held until later. We of course had 00:14:00.269 --> 00:14:04.006 damaged center and that was how could you tell us about how damaged center 00:14:04.039 --> 00:14:10.917 , how that came to be built? President Gammage and frank Lloyd wright were 00:14:10.950 --> 00:14:17.207 friends and they got together and discussed the design for the building 00:14:17.240 --> 00:14:23.677 that was a very exciting time And it was not only of interest here in the 00:14:23.710 --> 00:14:29.557 valley and statewide, but there were stories all over the country and even 00:14:29.590 --> 00:14:34.746 when it opened, even some people from europe came to the grand opening the 00:14:34.779 --> 00:14:40.667 opening weekend, Eugene Ormandy and the philadelphia Orchestra, We're here 00:14:40.700 --> 00:14:48.006 for that opening gala weekend. And also they presented 00:14:48.039 --> 00:14:54.817 ah Camelot, a wonderful production of Camelot. And in those days everybody 00:14:54.850 --> 00:15:02.167 wore formal dresses. It was, it was an exciting time. What is it that it 00:15:02.200 --> 00:15:04.707 opened in 1964? 00:15:04.740 --> 00:15:09.346 That was after the, after President Gamage had died. It was and of course 00:15:09.379 --> 00:15:14.457 it was called Grady Gammage Memorial Auditorium. But he had worked, it 00:15:14.490 --> 00:15:18.947 made a great deal to him. He had worked with frank Lloyd wright on the 00:15:18.980 --> 00:15:23.667 plans for it in the building. And I've heard that the original plans were 00:15:23.700 --> 00:15:26.256 done to me that there was supposed to be built somewhere else. You know? 00:15:26.289 --> 00:15:31.756 That's true. I think so. I think somewhere abroad and of course originally 00:15:31.789 --> 00:15:38.297 they were going to be ponds at the end of the walkways that go down like 00:15:38.330 --> 00:15:42.756 this, that we're going to be lakes there. But finances were always a 00:15:42.789 --> 00:15:48.087 problem. We never had the money we needed for things. I guess that's still 00:15:48.120 --> 00:15:53.496 true today. We're still trying to, but they had to cut back on some of the 00:15:53.529 --> 00:15:59.707 plans. Right. But it was, it was a wonderful time. Very exciting. 00:15:59.740 --> 00:16:06.207 Certainly changed the look of campus. They did. They did, yeah. 00:16:06.240 --> 00:16:09.447 Do you know remember anybody else that was involved in the construction of 00:16:09.480 --> 00:16:13.407 that? You mentioned the David? 00:16:13.440 --> 00:16:17.197 Well, he was founding director of damage and he's the one that arranged 00:16:17.230 --> 00:16:22.817 all the events and I would write about them and talk to him and discuss it. 00:16:22.850 --> 00:16:28.907 And we'd I'd uh get the stories to all the papers and radio and 00:16:28.940 --> 00:16:36.940 television about the events that damage. And also it was such a, a 00:16:36.970 --> 00:16:42.606 wonderful thing to be able to work with art faculty. 00:16:42.639 --> 00:16:47.807 Oh, there were so many of them Don Schomburg and Bengu who were sculptors 00:16:47.840 --> 00:16:55.840 and the hedge of the art department and he broke them and Henry Bruinsma 00:16:57.350 --> 00:17:05.350 George Amberson. Uh because Harold Hines was conductor of the band. And 00:17:07.539 --> 00:17:12.607 Eugene Lombardi with conductor of the symphony orchestra. They were all 00:17:12.640 --> 00:17:18.046 just great people in the art department. You've got down here, Eugene 00:17:18.079 --> 00:17:22.437 Grigsby, do you remember when he came here? I don't remember what year, 00:17:22.470 --> 00:17:29.046 but I certainly enjoyed talking with him and and working. I would 00:17:29.079 --> 00:17:35.947 interview people and then write stories about the art shows there, art 00:17:35.980 --> 00:17:42.266 shows and about the music programs, dance concerts and I thought that was 00:17:42.299 --> 00:17:48.677 very important to let they enriched the university and the students and 00:17:48.710 --> 00:17:54.937 the faculty there, but also for the community. It was such a rich 00:17:54.970 --> 00:17:59.167 experience for the community and I thought it was important for them to 00:17:59.200 --> 00:18:03.967 know what was available and that's why it, I never cease being 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:07.586 enthusiastic about my job. 00:18:07.619 --> 00:18:11.467 And Eugene Grigsby of course was african american. Were there very many 00:18:11.500 --> 00:18:15.306 african american faculty at that time. 00:18:15.339 --> 00:18:23.339 So many at that time. No mark sunk it in on the music faculty and also was 00:18:23.559 --> 00:18:31.559 african american. But there were not that many. 00:18:31.839 --> 00:18:37.207 He got down Rudy turf. Can you tell me about him? Well, he was curator and 00:18:37.240 --> 00:18:43.046 director of the Art museum and I have brought wonderful art shows to 00:18:43.079 --> 00:18:46.816 campus. What's he like? I'm going to interview him later. What should I be 00:18:46.849 --> 00:18:52.407 asking? Um, 00:18:52.440 --> 00:18:58.826 I guess I asked him what kind of art he tried to develop what he, what he 00:18:58.859 --> 00:19:06.097 brought to the museum and his work as a curator. I think that would be an 00:19:06.130 --> 00:19:11.296 interesting story. Do you remember when he came with? I can't remember 00:19:11.329 --> 00:19:17.006 dates like that. It's difficult. But you were already here when? Oh yes, 00:19:17.039 --> 00:19:23.996 yeah, cube broadly had been curated before. Rudy turk so and I I came when 00:19:24.029 --> 00:19:29.207 he was there. How did things change when he came? 00:19:29.240 --> 00:19:36.427 Mm hmm. Everything got larger. We had more artwork and of course 00:19:36.460 --> 00:19:42.069 eventually the new art museum was built but that was a lot of years later. 00:19:43.140 --> 00:19:45.140 Seriously, you should cut down here. 00:19:48.140 --> 00:19:52.177 Jim Jim Elmore is another one that's on our list to interview. Tell me 00:19:52.210 --> 00:19:57.347 about him. He was head of architecture and every year the students would 00:19:57.380 --> 00:20:03.417 have an exhibit of, of designs that they developed and that was another 00:20:03.450 --> 00:20:09.607 thing that I covered. We'd get pictures of of the student work and they 00:20:09.640 --> 00:20:17.546 they had wonderfully creative designs and had them on on show so that 00:20:17.579 --> 00:20:21.447 people could see them. The school of architecture was pretty new in the 00:20:21.480 --> 00:20:29.480 50s. Yes it was Because um A. S. A. S. C. Arizona State College became 00:20:29.920 --> 00:20:36.107 Arizona State University in 1960 for I believe it was. And of course that 00:20:36.140 --> 00:20:43.107 was a huge project everybody was involved in that. It was it was a team 00:20:43.140 --> 00:20:49.197 project, the students, the faculty, the alumni of course the News bureau 00:20:49.230 --> 00:20:56.207 was part of the team and it was a major victory for president damage when 00:20:56.240 --> 00:21:01.226 indeed the vote went the way we hoped it would and we became a university 00:21:01.259 --> 00:21:06.207 instead of being just a college? Why was that so important? 00:21:06.240 --> 00:21:11.026 It was the only way it could have grown the way it did. We went from 00:21:11.059 --> 00:21:16.086 having departments to having four colleges within the university and those 00:21:16.119 --> 00:21:24.119 were business and liberal arts. Um Let's see the science and Technology 00:21:25.539 --> 00:21:32.157 And education. Those were the four colleges. And of course it just kept 00:21:32.190 --> 00:21:36.147 growing and expanding from there. And how about the school of Architecture 00:21:36.180 --> 00:21:43.496 ? How did that get started or how did that grow? Um Once once he became a 00:21:43.529 --> 00:21:49.536 university it was possible for to add colleges and to add schools of and 00:21:49.569 --> 00:21:56.207 things like that so that it became much more inclusive. 00:21:56.240 --> 00:22:03.826 Do you remember when the law school got started? Yeah. Again I'm shaky on 00:22:03.859 --> 00:22:09.657 dates but dates are important. Just tell me about what happened. Um We 00:22:09.690 --> 00:22:13.766 were excited to get that. There was the competition between the U. Of A. 00:22:13.799 --> 00:22:19.306 And S. You. And of course they got the the 00:22:19.339 --> 00:22:27.339 College of Medicine and uh we got the College of Law and that was that was 00:22:29.140 --> 00:22:37.140 a whole new area for us and just kept once, once it became a university it 00:22:38.079 --> 00:22:42.486 was much more possible to bring in these other programs, the School of 00:22:42.519 --> 00:22:50.519 Nursing and the College of Fine Arts. And it uh it developed from there. 00:22:54.740 --> 00:22:57.697 You talked about Grady Gammage. Um Why don't you talk about some of the 00:22:57.730 --> 00:23:03.276 presidents that came after HD Richardson who had been academic vice 00:23:03.309 --> 00:23:09.726 president, served as interim president between President Gammage and Homer 00:23:09.759 --> 00:23:17.759 G. Durham. And I remember President Durham um he was very much I felt a 00:23:18.779 --> 00:23:26.607 people person and sometimes I ran into him on the mall one day and in fact 00:23:26.640 --> 00:23:32.107 every time I saw him he would ask me how my son was doing and my daughter 00:23:32.140 --> 00:23:38.326 was doing by name and I thought that was pretty special that he would 00:23:38.359 --> 00:23:43.576 take the time to do that and be interested in the people who worked for 00:23:43.609 --> 00:23:48.316 him and their families. 00:23:48.349 --> 00:23:51.607 And after Durham was 00:23:51.640 --> 00:23:57.207 harry newborn, what was he like? He was only president for a couple of 00:23:57.240 --> 00:24:01.847 years. He was interim president for one year and 00:24:01.880 --> 00:24:08.707 regular president for a year. And then after that Russ nelson I think, 00:24:08.740 --> 00:24:12.056 oh yeah john swatter 00:24:12.089 --> 00:24:20.089 get him, I don't want to forget him. He was um mhm, very much a ceo of big 00:24:22.130 --> 00:24:28.516 business. It was, it had a different feel to it, but each, each one of the 00:24:28.549 --> 00:24:33.586 president's I think brought what was needed at the time. Each one 00:24:33.619 --> 00:24:38.607 contributed something different and special. 00:24:38.640 --> 00:24:43.097 And then you mentioned nelson, what tell me about nelson. He was more laid 00:24:43.130 --> 00:24:49.006 back and 00:24:49.039 --> 00:24:53.806 easy to work with. What did he bring? 00:24:53.839 --> 00:24:57.006 Huh? 00:24:57.039 --> 00:25:04.907 I'm trying to think what new things 00:25:04.940 --> 00:25:12.940 just, I think rapport with the community. I would think of with him and I 00:25:13.779 --> 00:25:18.276 think it was important to let the people in the community know what was 00:25:18.309 --> 00:25:22.806 happening at the university that 00:25:22.839 --> 00:25:27.026 I think that was something that he was very successful at, that was part 00:25:27.059 --> 00:25:31.597 of your job. Yes, very definitely. Tell me a little more about the news 00:25:31.630 --> 00:25:36.726 bureau. How big was the news bureau when you started for people? And we 00:25:36.759 --> 00:25:43.806 had old standard typewriters, old clunky standard typewriters joe spring 00:25:43.839 --> 00:25:50.207 was, I don't think he ever went over budget. He was very aware of the 00:25:50.240 --> 00:25:57.887 tightness of the financial situation. And so we started out with that kind 00:25:57.920 --> 00:26:04.197 of typewriter, we would Type two stories, 1 type of story for the Republic 00:26:04.230 --> 00:26:09.417 , the Arizona republic. And then, because that and the phoenix gazette, 00:26:09.450 --> 00:26:14.256 they were competitive papers in those days. We'd write a second version 00:26:14.289 --> 00:26:18.467 for the phoenix gazette. And then with each of the two versions we do 00:26:18.500 --> 00:26:23.707 seven carbon copies and those carbon copies went to the temporary daily 00:26:23.740 --> 00:26:30.097 News, the mesa tribune the Scottsdale progress. We hand delivered the 00:26:30.130 --> 00:26:36.147 stories to the Republican cadet and temporary news and if it was a story 00:26:36.180 --> 00:26:40.677 that was going to go all over the state for some reason a major event then 00:26:40.710 --> 00:26:46.526 we'd mimeograph it and mail it out. But normally we just do this carbon 00:26:46.559 --> 00:26:53.036 copies of things. And finally, finally we got electric typewriters and 00:26:53.069 --> 00:26:56.947 before I left we were all using computers. But what a difference. We also 00:26:56.980 --> 00:27:01.976 got a Xerox machine during that period and that made a tremendous 00:27:02.009 --> 00:27:05.546 difference. You can imagine having to hand deliver things that would take 00:27:05.579 --> 00:27:10.367 a lot of time. Yeah, yeah, either joe or I would go down to the papers of 00:27:10.400 --> 00:27:15.657 course we talked to people and and were able to develop a good 00:27:15.690 --> 00:27:20.657 communication with them. And the papers in those early days were very 00:27:20.690 --> 00:27:26.207 generous with space. They used practically everything. We wrote verbatim 00:27:26.240 --> 00:27:33.796 and we do when there were events like a Band Aid and Homecoming. We get 00:27:33.829 --> 00:27:38.476 pictures of those and write a story and have cut lines and they would give 00:27:38.509 --> 00:27:44.756 the whole picture pages and by the time I retired we were lucky to get a 00:27:44.789 --> 00:27:50.427 listing in in the calendar of events. But in those early days the papers 00:27:50.460 --> 00:27:54.816 were very open to material from the news bureau. So the news business 00:27:54.849 --> 00:28:01.387 changed a lot. Yes, people today can't imagine a day when you couldn't. I 00:28:01.420 --> 00:28:04.707 know, I know. 00:28:04.740 --> 00:28:12.457 Uh huh, mm hmm. So was your main job then with the nature of the news 00:28:12.490 --> 00:28:17.486 bureau, was writing articles for the outside people have that change. Um 00:28:17.519 --> 00:28:21.887 did you start doing more on campus things now? Um the state press people 00:28:21.920 --> 00:28:27.976 would come and get copies of our stories and use them K E T would pick up 00:28:28.009 --> 00:28:35.377 stories from us. Um our job always was to do stories for the regional and 00:28:35.410 --> 00:28:41.806 local and sometimes national media that 00:28:41.839 --> 00:28:44.907 and I, 00:28:44.940 --> 00:28:49.107 I don't know today exactly what changes have been made because I've been 00:28:49.140 --> 00:28:56.236 retired for 20 years, but until I left, that was, that was our purpose. Um 00:28:56.269 --> 00:29:00.826 I developed a calendar of events where by that time, so many things going 00:29:00.859 --> 00:29:08.097 on. Um and I get that at once a month to all the papers and the radio 00:29:08.130 --> 00:29:14.947 station and probably wrote 2030 stories a week because we, we did 00:29:14.980 --> 00:29:22.266 everything we wrote about students recitals and than major events of 00:29:22.299 --> 00:29:28.887 damage about plays and operas and art shows. And there was a lot of 00:29:28.920 --> 00:29:31.006 cultural 00:29:31.039 --> 00:29:35.826 opportunities there. Your focus will was we'll see on the local newspapers. 00:29:35.859 --> 00:29:41.467 Is that where you really hope mostly tv or not nationally. Well, we sent 00:29:41.500 --> 00:29:49.500 it always to tv and some national, but our main focus was the, the state 00:29:51.569 --> 00:29:57.286 papers. Mhm 00:29:57.319 --> 00:30:00.897 Now I know they have the staff newspaper, I think the news bureau does 00:30:00.930 --> 00:30:05.417 some of that insight. Did they have that when you were there? Did you also 00:30:05.450 --> 00:30:12.877 do more with the staff that I think started later inside. I can't remember 00:30:12.910 --> 00:30:16.907 exactly when. But 00:30:16.940 --> 00:30:20.607 we didn't do that. There was the publications that was a different 00:30:20.640 --> 00:30:26.197 department than ours. We had nothing to do with that and publications did 00:30:26.230 --> 00:30:31.437 some of that and did brochures and things of that sort. So it was 00:30:31.470 --> 00:30:39.470 different department. How big was it when you left then retired? 00:30:40.640 --> 00:30:46.607 See there were 4500 when I went to work there. There were about 00:30:46.640 --> 00:30:54.417 45,000 when I left. That's why I say it just grew and grew. And then the 00:30:54.450 --> 00:30:58.707 news bureau, how much bigger was not much bigger. We just, we just worked 00:30:58.740 --> 00:31:01.207 a lot harder. 00:31:01.240 --> 00:31:06.607 Yeah. Well, that's interesting. Let's see 00:31:06.640 --> 00:31:11.816 there were probably, there may have been six people by that time. Mm hmm. 00:31:11.849 --> 00:31:17.506 And we did have by then we did have computers that made a big difference. 00:31:17.539 --> 00:31:20.407 Okay. 00:31:20.440 --> 00:31:26.326 What are you proudest of from what you did here at A. S. U. What I have to 00:31:26.359 --> 00:31:34.359 say that the thing I'm proudest of is whole body of work on the, it was 00:31:35.539 --> 00:31:39.826 important to me to meet deadlines for the newspapers to get the 00:31:39.859 --> 00:31:46.006 entertainment information out to them in time to meet their deadlines. And 00:31:46.039 --> 00:31:51.667 as I say, there'd be often 2030 stories a week. I would interview people 00:31:51.700 --> 00:31:57.597 interview the faculty, the students find out what their purpose was in the 00:31:57.630 --> 00:32:04.086 play they were doing or perhaps talk about costumes. Talk about the dance 00:32:04.119 --> 00:32:10.627 programs and what they were trying to show through the dance. And I also 00:32:10.660 --> 00:32:18.660 had quite a few reference books on music and dance and theater. And once I 00:32:18.839 --> 00:32:22.996 I had interviewed people, then I would write the story and we'd take it 00:32:23.029 --> 00:32:30.816 from there. Somebody's calling 00:32:30.849 --> 00:32:37.806 wondering, yeah, I couldn't figure out what it was. 00:32:37.839 --> 00:32:41.816 Oh, that would 00:32:41.849 --> 00:32:46.006 eventually, it'll stop. 00:32:46.039 --> 00:32:51.707 You're not giving up. Mhm. 00:32:51.740 --> 00:32:56.927 I don't think it's gonna stop. That's a persistent person. The arts. It 00:32:56.960 --> 00:33:01.897 was almost entirely, as I say, I started out writing stories for the 00:33:01.930 --> 00:33:07.887 women's page, but that quickly shifted. And and it was all of the arts 00:33:07.920 --> 00:33:14.756 that I was responsible for somebody else covering more of the, the 00:33:14.789 --> 00:33:22.256 research and science. I did a few stories in that area, but mostly focused 00:33:22.289 --> 00:33:29.006 on the arts. Yeah. That's monitoring 00:33:29.039 --> 00:33:31.707 training. 00:33:31.740 --> 00:33:35.306 Were you the only woman at the news bureau when you started? Yes, I was 00:33:35.339 --> 00:33:38.167 that we had a secretary. 00:33:38.200 --> 00:33:43.927 Was that unusual for a woman to be hired there for that position? Well, 00:33:43.960 --> 00:33:49.207 there hadn't, as far as I know, there hadn't been any women before me. 00:33:49.240 --> 00:33:53.907 How long before another woman came in? 00:33:53.940 --> 00:33:56.607 Oh, probably, 00:33:56.640 --> 00:33:59.006 maybe 00:33:59.039 --> 00:34:04.117 10 years. five years. I'm not sure. There were quite a few over the years 00:34:04.150 --> 00:34:08.706 after that june. And I've been working with the Arizona press women 00:34:08.739 --> 00:34:16.006 history. Were you a member of Arizona press women? No, I wasn't. 00:34:16.039 --> 00:34:20.097 There weren't that many in the 50s when June was getting started. Yeah. So 00:34:20.130 --> 00:34:24.186 it was kind of unusual then for you to be a reporter. Yeah. Well I had 00:34:24.219 --> 00:34:29.126 done that up in the very valley for the very independent. So I've had a 00:34:29.159 --> 00:34:33.517 little experience, but there were probably weren't very many women up 00:34:33.550 --> 00:34:39.157 there either. No, it was a husband and wife, Bill Reid and his wife who 00:34:39.190 --> 00:34:47.190 were publishers of and so she was a a reporter too. 00:34:48.139 --> 00:34:54.887 Um six thank you covered most of the things here on your notes. Anything 00:34:54.920 --> 00:34:58.686 that I didn't, I asked you about, you've got some more names. I have your 00:34:58.719 --> 00:35:02.307 list of questions there too. 00:35:02.340 --> 00:35:06.936 Look over your notes and see if there's anything you job spring. What was 00:35:06.969 --> 00:35:14.456 the work? Joe was a really unique person. He grew up as an english 00:35:14.489 --> 00:35:22.387 professor and he was a authority on Shakespeare. He could pull Shakespeare 00:35:22.420 --> 00:35:30.186 just all the time. He loved that. Um, but he also was a, his, his vision 00:35:30.219 --> 00:35:35.807 for the news bureau was, we operated more like a a newspaper office really. 00:35:35.840 --> 00:35:43.840 And so everybody had a general task but like, like I was to do the the 00:35:44.429 --> 00:35:52.327 fine arts, but we all just, we would meet in the morning and and have a 00:35:52.360 --> 00:35:56.856 general idea of what the day was going to be. But we pretty much went out 00:35:56.889 --> 00:36:03.727 on our own and dug stuff up, interviewed and then wrote articles and joe 00:36:03.760 --> 00:36:07.586 himself would take them down to the newspaper and meet with the people 00:36:07.619 --> 00:36:12.177 down at the newspaper. So it sounds like you're almost like a stringer for 00:36:12.210 --> 00:36:16.847 the newspaper. Yeah, yeah. I'm sure they wouldn't have liked to call it 00:36:16.880 --> 00:36:20.486 that, but but they did use our stories. They frequently would give us 00:36:20.519 --> 00:36:28.519 bylines and it was, it was exciting to see them how much of the material 00:36:30.860 --> 00:36:38.860 they did use. And of course, as I said, my my main purpose was two 00:36:40.130 --> 00:36:45.557 let the people in the community know what was available on campus and I 00:36:45.590 --> 00:36:51.407 guess it was sort of social embedded nous even back then, that's what 00:36:51.440 --> 00:36:58.336 we're doing nowadays, I believe with President Crow, but we did it in in a 00:36:58.369 --> 00:37:04.617 minor way in the early days, I think through letting people know so many 00:37:04.650 --> 00:37:10.597 of the events were open free to the public and it really enriched the 00:37:10.630 --> 00:37:18.630 community. There weren't uh, that many cultural centers in those days. The 00:37:19.519 --> 00:37:24.827 universities provided a lot of what was available. And that was important 00:37:24.860 --> 00:37:30.097 for people when they tried to bring in business is because 00:37:30.130 --> 00:37:33.756 people that worked for the businesses wanted to know. Well, what sort of 00:37:33.789 --> 00:37:38.137 cultural events do you have? What about times when there were troubles on 00:37:38.170 --> 00:37:43.396 campus during the Vietnam War protests during the 60s. 00:37:43.429 --> 00:37:47.997 Um 00:37:48.030 --> 00:37:54.896 actually I thought we got through that better than a lot of places did. I 00:37:54.929 --> 00:38:02.197 know there were a couple of times when we had some unrest and they, I'll 00:38:02.230 --> 00:38:07.086 give these to you. So I don't rattle 00:38:07.119 --> 00:38:13.597 the campus security would come. But for the most part it was, it was 00:38:13.630 --> 00:38:18.197 pretty quiet on campus. Well, did the news bureau have to issue news 00:38:18.230 --> 00:38:23.467 releases about those things too? Mhm. Did you ever get involved in writing 00:38:23.500 --> 00:38:28.836 those stories? Not too much. 00:38:28.869 --> 00:38:33.106 Are there any times that you remember things that were not happy that you 00:38:33.139 --> 00:38:39.887 had to cover? Um we're unhappy times on mm hmm. 00:38:39.920 --> 00:38:45.617 When people died, that was unhappy, we missed them. Um You hear when 00:38:45.650 --> 00:38:52.137 Gammage died? Yeah. What was that? Well, it was a loss and it was, he was 00:38:52.170 --> 00:38:57.287 a fine president. It was very sudden to 00:38:57.320 --> 00:39:03.986 I'm trying to think of the things that 00:39:04.019 --> 00:39:11.686 I mostly remember the happy times. Mhm. The 00:39:11.719 --> 00:39:17.947 money was always a problem. Still is for not only a shoe but education 00:39:17.980 --> 00:39:24.236 everywhere in the country. I think parking that was another problem and 00:39:24.269 --> 00:39:28.026 probably still is. Although the parking structures have made a difference 00:39:28.059 --> 00:39:34.117 there. But when I first went to work there, you could park, I parked our 00:39:34.150 --> 00:39:38.006 office was in the administration building and I could park just right 00:39:38.039 --> 00:39:43.227 there by the window of the office. And of course as time went by I got 00:39:43.260 --> 00:39:47.606 more and more difficult to find parking places. I used to go home for 00:39:47.639 --> 00:39:53.217 lunch at noon but got, so I couldn't do that because you couldn't find a 00:39:53.250 --> 00:40:01.250 parking place if you left for lunch. And so parking? And as far as any 00:40:01.829 --> 00:40:08.916 other stress for me personally, probably having to meet deadlines wanting 00:40:08.949 --> 00:40:13.436 to meet deadlines. But it can get stressful when you you're dependent on 00:40:13.469 --> 00:40:17.146 other people whether they get the stories and the information to you on 00:40:17.179 --> 00:40:22.827 time and but it was an exciting job. I loved it. Well you must have you 00:40:22.860 --> 00:40:27.477 stayed a long time. Did you ever think when you came here that you'd stay 00:40:27.510 --> 00:40:31.646 that long? I don't think I thought about it one way or another. I just 00:40:31.679 --> 00:40:35.296 took it one day at a time. What was it that made you stay all those years 00:40:35.329 --> 00:40:41.146 ? I loved the university, I thought it was important work work I enjoyed 00:40:41.179 --> 00:40:46.776 and I cared about 00:40:46.809 --> 00:40:51.807 what university stands for, what higher education is about. I think that's 00:40:51.840 --> 00:40:59.840 the only way we can grow and learn as people. Mhm. 00:41:00.409 --> 00:41:03.597 Well I think I've covered most of the things. Oh I know I didn't ask you 00:41:03.630 --> 00:41:06.666 about your advice for young people today that are trying to choose a 00:41:06.699 --> 00:41:12.916 career. How what do you tell people? Oh well as far as colleges concerned 00:41:12.949 --> 00:41:18.416 to find a college that has a program in in what they're interested in? If 00:41:18.449 --> 00:41:23.017 I if they've already made up their minds what they want to do and I think 00:41:23.050 --> 00:41:28.526 as far as their career is concerned I would say try to find a career that 00:41:28.559 --> 00:41:32.947 you feel passionate about that really matters to you because that worked 00:41:32.980 --> 00:41:39.347 for me and I think it would work for other people too. Mhm. Anything else 00:41:39.380 --> 00:41:43.907 you wanted to tell us that I didn't ask you? I can't really think of 00:41:43.940 --> 00:41:48.907 anything, anything june that I should have asked. Well, I wanted to 00:41:48.940 --> 00:41:55.936 comment on joe and she did. Yeah, he was a great person. 00:41:55.969 --> 00:41:59.776 Yeah. Yes. 00:41:59.809 --> 00:42:07.809 Okay. I think I heard everything. 00:42:08.570 --> 00:42:11.537 The 00:42:11.570 --> 00:42:19.570 because Elizabeth Bonnie came from, my husband named me that partly 00:42:19.889 --> 00:42:27.889 because of my scotch ancestry. And uh mm just he said I was Bonnie which 00:42:28.409 --> 00:42:36.409 means in scotches. He thought I was pretty. 00:42:36.409 --> 00:42:38.570 Mm hmm.