WEBVTT 00:00:00.959 --> 00:00:06.085 And we are doing this interview today in the studios of Kae Channel eight 00:00:06.118 --> 00:00:11.187 at ASU, the public television station here and today is Wednesday, 00:00:11.220 --> 00:00:17.467 February 22 of 2006. And we're conducting this interview as a living 00:00:17.500 --> 00:00:20.855 history for the living history video project for the Arizona State 00:00:20.888 --> 00:00:24.285 University Retirees Association. 00:00:24.318 --> 00:00:27.785 I'd like to have you introduce yourself if you could give us your full 00:00:27.818 --> 00:00:34.277 name, right? I'm uh Frank uh J sack the Js for Joseph. Very good. And can 00:00:34.310 --> 00:00:37.875 you tell me where you were born? And when you were born? Right? I was born 00:00:37.908 --> 00:00:41.546 in um 1912 00:00:41.579 --> 00:00:47.906 and in Chicago, Illinois, actually the central city those familiar with 00:00:47.939 --> 00:00:53.557 Chicago will recognize the Drake Hotel in Oak Street Beach. And I was born 00:00:53.590 --> 00:01:00.335 exactly one mile west of that landmark. I was born and raised there for uh 00:01:00.368 --> 00:01:04.367 had a very happy boyhood there too. What did your parents do um in the 00:01:04.400 --> 00:01:12.400 city there? My uh father was um uh take up, I would call an assistant 00:01:13.159 --> 00:01:20.257 engineer in a roundhouse for the uh Chicago Northwestern Railroad in the 00:01:20.290 --> 00:01:25.867 maintenance area, the roundhouse when they bring in the, the vehicles for 00:01:25.900 --> 00:01:33.156 maintenance. Mother of course, was a homemaker, taking homemaker, taking 00:01:33.189 --> 00:01:36.346 care of five Children. 00:01:36.379 --> 00:01:42.536 And where did you fall among the five? Right in the middle. The sister was 00:01:42.569 --> 00:01:46.915 the eldest and then one older brother. Then I fell in the middle and two 00:01:46.948 --> 00:01:49.406 younger brothers. 00:01:49.439 --> 00:01:53.846 What was it like growing up in Chicago back then? Well, Chicago was much 00:01:53.879 --> 00:01:59.867 smaller than it is now and I found it a very exciting city and it was a 00:01:59.900 --> 00:02:04.367 nice place to explore, particularly in the summer time during vacation 00:02:04.400 --> 00:02:12.085 period. Uh My young colleagues and I could uh ride the trolley car for 00:02:12.118 --> 00:02:20.118 three cents and they had a transfer system where you could transfer and go 00:02:21.080 --> 00:02:25.396 other vehicles to other parts of the city as long as you went forward and 00:02:25.429 --> 00:02:30.666 laterally and never went back. But for three cents, we could spend half a 00:02:30.699 --> 00:02:36.646 day exploring the city and that was a lot of fun. What sort of places did 00:02:36.679 --> 00:02:42.666 you like to go? What did you like to do? Well, we like Lincoln Park that 00:02:42.699 --> 00:02:49.725 was nearby within easy walking distance about a mile away. And we used to 00:02:49.758 --> 00:02:56.566 admire all the statues of the historical figures mostly on horseback. 00:02:56.599 --> 00:03:01.077 There was a Jackson Park on the south side that was about two miles away, 00:03:01.110 --> 00:03:07.636 but no problem walking that distance. And we would visit that a good deal. 00:03:07.669 --> 00:03:11.536 Lincoln Park was one of our favorites because at that time, there was a, 00:03:11.569 --> 00:03:13.646 a 00:03:13.679 --> 00:03:18.596 tuberculosis sanitarium there. And that was always a stop for us because 00:03:18.629 --> 00:03:23.327 the nurses would give us milk and cookies. 00:03:23.360 --> 00:03:28.446 Very nice. What about school? Where did you go to school? Well, the, uh, 00:03:28.479 --> 00:03:34.116 elementary school was in the neighborhood. There was no problem there. Uh 00:03:34.149 --> 00:03:41.106 , the high school was, uh, about a mile away. No problem there. And, uh, I 00:03:41.139 --> 00:03:46.286 did, uh, start college at Northwestern University. Evanston, right 00:03:46.319 --> 00:03:52.827 adjacent to Chicago. Um, as a boy, were you a good student in school? Uh I 00:03:52.860 --> 00:04:00.646 , I think so the grades indicated I, I was a pretty fair student. And what 00:04:00.679 --> 00:04:03.446 subjects did you like? 00:04:03.479 --> 00:04:09.816 I like the science subjects. Anything involving physics, science and 00:04:09.849 --> 00:04:16.495 mathematics. What did you want to do when you grew up? Well, from, as far 00:04:16.528 --> 00:04:21.616 back as I can remember, I wanted to be a soldier 00:04:21.649 --> 00:04:26.916 and that opportunity came in 1929. This was the height of the Depression 00:04:26.949 --> 00:04:34.949 and um I found that I could join the Illinois National Guard and start my 00:04:35.040 --> 00:04:38.366 military career. I didn't know that it was going to be the start of my 00:04:38.399 --> 00:04:43.645 military career, but it was, I had to say I was uh 6, uh 18 years old. I 00:04:43.678 --> 00:04:50.786 was only 16, but nobody was asking any questions. So I uh started the 00:04:50.819 --> 00:04:56.666 career there. This was in 1929 while in 1939 the war clouds were gathering 00:04:56.699 --> 00:05:04.699 , Hitler was on a rampage and uh the uh Japanese were plundering the 00:05:04.899 --> 00:05:12.899 Southeast Asia for oil and we had a very, very weak army, hardly any army 00:05:13.959 --> 00:05:19.156 at all. And the country realized it had to build up for its own security. 00:05:19.189 --> 00:05:23.656 By that time, I was a captain of infantry in the Illinois National Guard 00:05:23.689 --> 00:05:29.717 and was offered a regular army commission as a captain uh in, in the uh 00:05:29.750 --> 00:05:34.627 reconstructed army that we were doing. So I took advantage of it and then 00:05:34.660 --> 00:05:42.660 stage for 32 years, why did you originally want to be a soldier? 00:05:43.139 --> 00:05:49.437 Uh It's um probably something that appeals to uh boys at least and 00:05:49.470 --> 00:05:54.467 appealed to all of my friends of my age. My colleagues, you get uh 00:05:54.500 --> 00:05:59.676 ammunition to fire and you have guns to fire on weekends, you go to the 00:05:59.709 --> 00:06:06.015 outdoor ranges to fire these weapons and uh that appealed to me the uh 00:06:06.048 --> 00:06:11.546 being with weapons and ammunition and firing them. So originally when you 00:06:11.579 --> 00:06:16.046 were in the National Guard, did you have a regular other job or? Oh, yes, 00:06:16.079 --> 00:06:23.305 I had a regular job. I was working for RC A at the time we were developing 00:06:23.338 --> 00:06:30.387 the teleprinter, uh which became a means of communication uh between 00:06:30.420 --> 00:06:38.420 stations and between offices. And I was uh doing mostly clerical work. And 00:06:39.399 --> 00:06:44.776 uh that was my job which I promptly abandoned. Of course, when I had the 00:06:44.809 --> 00:06:50.676 opportunity to go on active duty with the army, um You didn't want to go 00:06:50.709 --> 00:06:57.656 into working for the railroad like your father. No. Uh it was uh sort of 00:06:57.689 --> 00:07:00.426 prosaic work, 00:07:00.459 --> 00:07:06.645 uh, oiling and repairing engines and locomotives. 00:07:06.678 --> 00:07:13.757 Um, what was your first paid job as a young boy? Well, my first paid job 00:07:13.790 --> 00:07:16.916 as a young boy was selling newspapers. 00:07:16.949 --> 00:07:24.949 I was, um, located near Chicago Avenue. I live south of Chicago Avenue and 00:07:25.428 --> 00:07:33.428 Chicago Avenue, uh, was noted to having a string of saloons and I could 00:07:33.939 --> 00:07:40.046 sell newspapers in those saloons and the, uh, patrons were very generous, 00:07:40.079 --> 00:07:44.606 uh, papers were three cents each and they usually give me a nickel and 00:07:44.639 --> 00:07:49.817 tell me to keep the Betty. So, uh, it was a very profitable venture. How 00:07:49.850 --> 00:07:55.986 old were you then? Oh, I was about 10, 9 or 10. It seems to be a common 00:07:56.019 --> 00:08:03.395 job for young boys in that time period. Um, let's see. Well, you actually 00:08:03.428 --> 00:08:07.637 grew up during the depression. Was that a tough time for your family? It 00:08:07.670 --> 00:08:13.467 was a tough time for dad, 00:08:13.500 --> 00:08:19.486 was working for the Chicago Northwestern Railroad. And, uh, he, um, it 00:08:19.519 --> 00:08:25.156 never got paid off. However, the pay was very, very small because the 00:08:25.189 --> 00:08:30.317 competition was severe. You remember we, speaking of a time when 00:08:30.350 --> 00:08:36.616 unemployment was 25% of the workforce and, uh, in as much as that at that 00:08:36.649 --> 00:08:42.657 time, we had one wager families that meant that, uh, 25% of the families 00:08:42.690 --> 00:08:47.677 poor without work. And that was the start of what we call now, the, uh, 00:08:47.710 --> 00:08:50.346 welfare programs. 00:08:50.379 --> 00:08:55.037 And Franklin Roosevelt, the president, uh, realized something had to be 00:08:55.070 --> 00:08:59.967 done. To alleviate the hardship and started a whole string of welfare 00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:06.186 programs such as uh assistance in housing and food stamps, things of that 00:09:06.219 --> 00:09:12.298 nature. So you were probably lucky to have any job as a young man. Oh, yes. 00:09:12.908 --> 00:09:14.908 The most priceless possession at that time was a job 00:09:18.149 --> 00:09:22.015 and they were hard to get. 00:09:22.048 --> 00:09:25.816 So. Well, tell me a little bit more about when you joined the military 00:09:25.849 --> 00:09:31.196 full time. Um Where did you go? Where were you sent? 00:09:31.229 --> 00:09:37.135 My first nation was Kemp Forest, uh Tennessee 00:09:37.168 --> 00:09:43.616 because it was a training area. And um I, I commanded a company to begin 00:09:43.649 --> 00:09:51.649 with. Uh and then a battalion that's about 808 100 men. And uh then I was 00:09:52.779 --> 00:09:58.145 told I would have to train this battalion and I would take it overseas. So 00:09:58.178 --> 00:10:03.505 I trained, this battalion took a little over a year until it was combat 00:10:03.538 --> 00:10:09.076 ready and it was determined to be combat ready. Then I was sent to the 00:10:09.109 --> 00:10:15.486 Southwest Pacific and I stayed with this battalion 00:10:15.519 --> 00:10:20.616 for about 9, 10 months until my regimental commander got killed in one of 00:10:20.649 --> 00:10:25.596 the battles that I took over the regiment which consisted of three 00:10:25.629 --> 00:10:28.395 battalions. 00:10:28.428 --> 00:10:34.936 So that's a lot of people. It was, 00:10:34.969 --> 00:10:38.157 and it was a little overwhelming at the start at the start because I was 00:10:38.190 --> 00:10:44.677 30 years old and that wasn't very mature to command that number of 00:10:44.710 --> 00:10:51.586 soldiers in a combat situation. But you learn to cope very quickly in a 00:10:51.619 --> 00:10:55.826 battle environment and a lot of those soldiers were even younger than that 00:10:55.859 --> 00:10:59.967 , weren't they? 00:11:00.000 --> 00:11:03.956 Are there any particular experiences? You remember about that period that 00:11:03.989 --> 00:11:07.667 I was wounded four times. 00:11:07.700 --> 00:11:15.700 Uh The first two times it was shrapnel and I have scars on my arms. And 00:11:16.808 --> 00:11:24.808 then the um, third time, a shell burst near my ear and broke both my 00:11:25.580 --> 00:11:31.696 eardrums. That's one reason I wanted the hearing aids. And the fourth one 00:11:31.729 --> 00:11:37.746 is the one that uh makes me walk, walk crooked. The bullet entered the 00:11:37.779 --> 00:11:43.446 right side of my body came on the left side, didn't hit a bone but it slid 00:11:43.479 --> 00:11:50.866 past the sciatic nerve. Fortunately, it didn't sever it, but slid past 00:11:50.899 --> 00:11:57.625 that. I had bruises and then arthritis and now osteoporosis, 00:11:57.658 --> 00:12:03.066 it's lucky you survived all that. But survival was the name of the game 00:12:03.099 --> 00:12:07.525 and I did survive were these, some of these battles ones that we would 00:12:07.558 --> 00:12:13.417 have heard of that you were in. Yes, one is in the news just today. The 00:12:13.450 --> 00:12:18.316 battle of Lee in the Philippines. It's in the news today because of the 00:12:18.349 --> 00:12:25.486 mudslides and uh the uh hundreds of people that have perished. But that 00:12:25.519 --> 00:12:32.755 was the toughest battle we had others. I started, my first battle was in M 00:12:32.788 --> 00:12:37.226 and the sole islands of the Netherlands, East Indies. And that gave us the 00:12:37.259 --> 00:12:45.259 reach to go into the Philippines and then in the Philippines. And that was 00:12:46.538 --> 00:12:50.907 a very, very tough battle because the enemy knew and we knew that it was 00:12:50.940 --> 00:12:56.217 critical and a key situation to the possession of the Philippines. Once we 00:12:56.250 --> 00:13:02.726 took the Philippines, then we had a landing platform to attack Japan. So 00:13:02.759 --> 00:13:08.106 that's why it was a severe battle at that point though. How did you get to 00:13:08.139 --> 00:13:13.956 those islands to attack them? Right. All of it was amphibious landings. We 00:13:13.989 --> 00:13:20.366 would go by large transports and then come down rope ladders into small 00:13:20.399 --> 00:13:26.226 craft to make the assault run to the beach. 00:13:26.259 --> 00:13:34.259 Were there a lot of men that were lost in those? Yes, in my battalion, 00:13:34.808 --> 00:13:42.808 uh I would lose um about 30% killed and wounded. How do you deal with that 00:13:45.418 --> 00:13:51.996 when you're out there? And well, 00:13:52.029 --> 00:13:58.907 the thing that helps you is time and doing it many times and it becomes 00:13:58.940 --> 00:14:02.996 sort of routine. 00:14:03.029 --> 00:14:07.576 Uh The uh commanders, 00:14:07.609 --> 00:14:10.746 the company commanders and I commanded the battalion and the first 00:14:10.779 --> 00:14:17.586 operation. Uh We become wedded to our, our, our team, our, there's a 00:14:17.619 --> 00:14:25.619 bonding that goes on. So when we're wounded, we don't want to be evacuated 00:14:25.928 --> 00:14:30.446 in the medical stream because we'll never come back to the unit. So what 00:14:30.479 --> 00:14:36.515 we usually did at that time, the corps man, we had corpsman, uh assistant 00:14:36.548 --> 00:14:42.025 medical officers working with us. They would uh take our wounds and clamp 00:14:42.058 --> 00:14:46.057 them shut, you know, bring the flesh together and clamp them, load them 00:14:46.090 --> 00:14:51.866 with penicillin and we would not then leave our unit. We would stay with 00:14:51.899 --> 00:14:57.755 the unit unless it got infected and then we would have to be evacuated. So 00:14:57.788 --> 00:15:02.356 all those wounds you had, you were not evacuated to a hospital. Never. No. 00:15:02.389 --> 00:15:08.167 And it was deliberate. So I would not leave my unit. You see, you, you uh 00:15:08.200 --> 00:15:13.625 , you get a, well, the it was the draft period. These were young draftees 00:15:13.658 --> 00:15:19.807 , 1819 year old and uh they were just at the age that they could have been 00:15:19.840 --> 00:15:26.356 my real Children. So I had to take care of him. 00:15:26.389 --> 00:15:30.927 Must have been hard though when you would lose so many of them. When I 00:15:30.960 --> 00:15:38.960 lose one of my soldiers, really part of me died with him. 00:15:39.479 --> 00:15:47.066 Ok, I think out there you get attached, you know, you do get attached. 00:15:47.099 --> 00:15:51.537 Um, of course, that was a long time ago when you look back. Are you sad 00:15:51.570 --> 00:15:56.446 about those times or how do you look back at those? I know there's no 00:15:56.479 --> 00:16:04.479 regret that you, um, did what was required of you. Uh, you know, it's not 00:16:05.658 --> 00:16:11.967 a pleasant thing killing people whom you don't know. Uh, but they're the 00:16:12.000 --> 00:16:18.967 enemy. So you, you, you kill them and, uh, 00:16:19.000 --> 00:16:24.265 you have some qualms about that. But, uh, as I look back, I, I have no 00:16:24.298 --> 00:16:30.326 regrets. I get what I was expected to do 00:16:30.359 --> 00:16:36.606 and I guess they would, they would kill you if they had the chance. So, 00:16:36.639 --> 00:16:41.537 June, that's my phone. Can you turn it off? My phone is in my purse 00:16:41.570 --> 00:16:44.356 ringing, 00:16:44.389 --> 00:16:50.287 it'll stop. Let's just wait, it'll stop. It will stop. Should have turned 00:16:50.320 --> 00:16:56.236 it off or left it somewhere else. 00:16:56.269 --> 00:17:02.297 Um, well, let's talk a little bit more about the, the war years. Um, after 00:17:02.330 --> 00:17:06.706 the, the that time in the Pacific. Where did you go from there? Uh, well, 00:17:06.739 --> 00:17:14.739 uh, during the, um, war in the Pacific, 00:17:14.817 --> 00:17:21.535 I was decorated with the silver star for 00:17:21.568 --> 00:17:29.568 Danner in action. And, uh, it was the same time I was promoted from 00:17:30.299 --> 00:17:34.436 battalion commander to regimental commander because uh my regimental 00:17:34.469 --> 00:17:40.107 commander had been killed and I took his job. And uh uh general Macarthur 00:17:40.140 --> 00:17:46.367 came, he was commanding the theater. He came to present 00:17:46.400 --> 00:17:53.575 the promotion and the medal to me along with others who had been decorated 00:17:53.608 --> 00:18:01.608 after the war. And he selected my division commander, a major general to 00:18:02.858 --> 00:18:05.795 be his chief of staff. 00:18:05.828 --> 00:18:13.828 So he sent a cable said, welcome you to Tokyo as my chief of staff. And uh 00:18:15.358 --> 00:18:21.825 will you bring with you that young colonel whom we promoted? So I tagged 00:18:21.858 --> 00:18:28.456 along and became a uh special assistant to General Macarthur during the 00:18:28.489 --> 00:18:36.489 time that he commanded as the supreme commander, all of Japan. Mhm. Was 00:18:36.578 --> 00:18:41.266 this before the bombs were dropped or? Yes, it was before the bombs were 00:18:41.299 --> 00:18:49.196 dropped. And um uh our uh 00:18:49.229 --> 00:18:52.226 big job 00:18:52.259 --> 00:19:00.259 there of course, was pacifying the uh I have to retract a little bit. Uh 00:19:01.930 --> 00:19:08.377 We were in, in uh a lady in the Philippines, as I mentioned, that was a 00:19:08.410 --> 00:19:12.236 big battle. Then we went to Luzon 00:19:12.269 --> 00:19:20.269 and it was at Luan. We used the base to land on the shores of Japan and we 00:19:21.779 --> 00:19:27.085 were developing the plan at that time. But we were all concerned because 00:19:27.118 --> 00:19:33.338 it was going to be a fierce landing because we were attacking the homeland. 00:19:33.618 --> 00:19:35.618 So uh we were quite apprehensive as to how we would be met. It would not 00:19:38.750 --> 00:19:45.717 be a homecoming when we hit the beaches of Japan. But we were saved by the 00:19:45.750 --> 00:19:48.867 uh Beaumont Hiroshima. 00:19:48.900 --> 00:19:51.676 The um 00:19:51.709 --> 00:19:59.709 emperor realized it was time to call it quits and he personally terminated 00:20:00.309 --> 00:20:06.295 the war. Now, the war could have terminated a year earlier because after 00:20:06.328 --> 00:20:12.176 we took LA the war in New Orleans, that the purposes was over. Now we were 00:20:12.209 --> 00:20:20.065 in a position to attack Japan. But we had a policy known as the 00:20:20.098 --> 00:20:24.387 unconditional surrender, 00:20:24.420 --> 00:20:31.516 which meant of course that all of the opposing generals on the losing side 00:20:31.549 --> 00:20:36.666 would be hung as war criminals. 00:20:36.699 --> 00:20:44.699 And that delayed the termination of the war because the generals were in 00:20:46.799 --> 00:20:51.035 command of the military of Japan 00:20:51.068 --> 00:20:57.406 and they would not sign their own death warrant. So they held out thinking 00:20:57.439 --> 00:21:03.127 that if we did attack Japan, they could make it so severe that we would 00:21:03.160 --> 00:21:11.160 negotiate a peace. But uh I've, I've also had second doubts about that uh 00:21:13.519 --> 00:21:19.565 policy of unconditional surrender. It really delayed the determination of 00:21:19.598 --> 00:21:24.065 the war in my opinion, it delayed by one year. 00:21:24.098 --> 00:21:28.097 A lot of people died during that year, a lot of people died during that 00:21:28.130 --> 00:21:34.295 year. The, um, by the way, we're coming up to the 60th anniversary of the 00:21:34.328 --> 00:21:40.986 dropping of the bomb which occurred on July 27. I remember that clearly 00:21:41.019 --> 00:21:46.065 and there will be a lot of discussion on the 60 th anniversary. Should we 00:21:46.098 --> 00:21:54.026 have dropped the bomb? How did you hear about it? Uh We had to do that. We 00:21:54.059 --> 00:21:59.756 had to do something. Now, the, at that time, I didn't realize all of the 00:21:59.789 --> 00:22:04.535 negotiations that were going on. But I did learn later when I had access 00:22:04.568 --> 00:22:12.568 to the files that, um, we tried bombing, you know, conventional bombing. 00:22:12.689 --> 00:22:20.689 Uh We bombed the Osaka a weird time. 66 00:22:22.098 --> 00:22:25.666 B 17 fortress airplanes 00:22:25.699 --> 00:22:31.476 in one wave dropped £500 bombs and then a second wave when we dropped 00:22:31.509 --> 00:22:39.315 incendiaries to burn up the rubble, create a firestorm in the city. And we 00:22:39.348 --> 00:22:43.555 did the same with several other cities. 00:22:43.588 --> 00:22:49.805 It had the capacity to do more but uh there was no surrender. 00:22:49.838 --> 00:22:53.555 Where were you? When you heard about that? They had dropped this bigger 00:22:53.588 --> 00:22:58.717 bomb. How did you hear about it? I was 00:22:58.750 --> 00:23:06.750 and the island of Luanne planning the invasion of Japan. 00:23:07.630 --> 00:23:12.137 And that would have been a tough one. That really would have been a tough 00:23:12.170 --> 00:23:20.170 one. So we were pleased when the emperor surrendered. Did you hadn't known 00:23:20.400 --> 00:23:24.897 anything though? About the atomic bomb before that. No, no. It was all, it 00:23:24.930 --> 00:23:31.357 was all a surprise when it came the manufacture of the bomb and then its 00:23:31.390 --> 00:23:39.390 use was very closely held by then President Truman. 00:23:40.130 --> 00:23:42.815 So were you surprised? 00:23:42.848 --> 00:23:48.266 I certainly was surprised that the bomb was developed under the president 00:23:48.299 --> 00:23:56.299 of Franklin Roosevelt at Los, at Los Alamos. But it was uh up to President 00:23:56.959 --> 00:24:02.746 Truman then to make the decision to drop it. 00:24:02.779 --> 00:24:08.976 Did you agree with that decision? I did, 00:24:09.009 --> 00:24:15.766 it stopped the killing on both sides and that alone made it worthwhile, I 00:24:15.799 --> 00:24:23.799 think. Ok, so what did you do after the war? Uh uh Well, I uh the war by 00:24:25.289 --> 00:24:29.946 then, the military was my career. 00:24:29.979 --> 00:24:36.756 So I went into the eu the general pattern of staff work and then 00:24:36.789 --> 00:24:42.236 commanding of troops and some more staff work and then commanding of 00:24:42.269 --> 00:24:44.637 troops. 00:24:44.670 --> 00:24:51.206 I had some interesting assignments during that period, I was assigned to 00:24:51.239 --> 00:24:56.456 Los Alamos with the Atomic Energy Commission for three years to be a 00:24:56.489 --> 00:25:01.617 planner to help the scientists fabricate and develop the first hydrogen 00:25:01.650 --> 00:25:03.956 bomb. 00:25:03.989 --> 00:25:09.006 And that was a fascinating experience. Uh When we dropped it on the island 00:25:09.039 --> 00:25:17.039 of Tinian, uh we thought we would get about three megatons that 3 million 00:25:17.130 --> 00:25:25.130 tons of explosive equivalent. Instead we got 4.2 it was a horrendous 00:25:25.199 --> 00:25:32.246 weapon and the pari bomb has never been used in anger and I hope it never 00:25:32.279 --> 00:25:40.279 is used in anger because uh one bomb will wipe out a complete city. 00:25:41.108 --> 00:25:48.276 50% of the people in the city will perish by blast and then 50% will have 00:25:48.309 --> 00:25:52.026 a slow death by radiation. 00:25:52.059 --> 00:25:57.226 That's what the hydrogen bomb will do. 00:25:57.259 --> 00:26:00.666 Hope we don't have to use it. 00:26:00.699 --> 00:26:04.815 So, so how did your career with the military? When did you finally retire 00:26:04.848 --> 00:26:09.137 ? Uh, 00:26:09.170 --> 00:26:13.186 I retired, uh, 00:26:13.219 --> 00:26:21.219 at, uh, 58 years of age but the record showed I was 60 years because of 00:26:21.769 --> 00:26:29.295 the two years I had fudged earlier, but 60 years. Was it? So that was the 00:26:29.328 --> 00:26:34.696 official record. So I retired at that time and, uh, miss a sack and I 00:26:34.729 --> 00:26:39.117 decided we would come to, uh, Scottsdale, Arizona to live because we had 00:26:39.150 --> 00:26:46.825 friends here and had visited from time to time. I done. I was very 00:26:46.858 --> 00:26:54.858 fortunate because at that time, Governor Jack Williams was having trouble 00:26:54.959 --> 00:27:01.016 with the budget and with grant programs with the federal government had a 00:27:01.049 --> 00:27:06.887 whole array of problems involving, involving finance. And so he was 00:27:06.920 --> 00:27:11.335 talking to, uh Senator Barry Goldwater about it once and Senator Barry 00:27:11.368 --> 00:27:14.406 Goldwater said, well, there's a fellow called Frank Zack and he's on his 00:27:14.439 --> 00:27:20.065 way to live in Scottsdale, you should talk with him and he did, gave me a 00:27:20.098 --> 00:27:24.097 job. Now, how did you know Barry Goldwater or how did Barry Goldwater know 00:27:24.130 --> 00:27:27.085 you? 00:27:27.118 --> 00:27:32.377 I hadn't met him in Washington DC, maybe at a reception or several 00:27:32.410 --> 00:27:39.325 receptions. And at one I had mentioned, I was going to Scottsdale to make 00:27:39.358 --> 00:27:44.996 that my home. So you weren't close friends with him. So, he, he passed 00:27:45.029 --> 00:27:49.506 that on and I found the assignment with Governor Jack Williams. Absolutely 00:27:49.539 --> 00:27:55.916 delightful. I was his special assistant for almost four years. What sort 00:27:55.949 --> 00:28:03.949 of projects did you work on? Uh, and mainly uh 00:28:04.529 --> 00:28:12.529 working with Washington on the budget and getting for Arizona, all of the 00:28:12.598 --> 00:28:19.575 grant programs that were available. There were a lot of programs available 00:28:19.608 --> 00:28:27.608 at that time to help states and the metropolitan areas achieve a degree of 00:28:28.920 --> 00:28:31.456 self sufficiency. 00:28:31.489 --> 00:28:39.367 And um uh I I was to look them over, analyze them and then recommend to 00:28:39.400 --> 00:28:46.835 the governor which would be suitable to Arizona for, 00:28:46.868 --> 00:28:51.756 for the betterment of the people and then he would apply for them. So it 00:28:51.789 --> 00:28:56.647 was that kind of work and what year was it that you came to Arizona that 00:28:56.680 --> 00:29:00.285 you moved here? 00:29:00.318 --> 00:29:04.867 1970 I believe? Yeah, 1970. 00:29:04.900 --> 00:29:12.900 So what was Arizona like? Then we uh it was smaller, you know, as you 00:29:13.239 --> 00:29:21.239 might expect because of the time of the calendar. Uh But uh a delightful 00:29:22.949 --> 00:29:29.835 and I particularly appreciated its spirit of independence. 00:29:29.868 --> 00:29:36.075 It was still a part of the Old West where the people accepted 00:29:36.108 --> 00:29:38.575 responsibility 00:29:38.608 --> 00:29:45.795 far out for themselves rather than depending on the government to provide 00:29:45.828 --> 00:29:49.085 help. 00:29:49.118 --> 00:29:52.285 What was Jack Williams like? 00:29:52.318 --> 00:30:00.318 Uh He uh it was very, very delightful person to work for. Uh his great 00:30:00.949 --> 00:30:06.597 characteristic I think is that he never accepted credit for all the good 00:30:06.630 --> 00:30:11.117 he did. He passed that to somebody else 00:30:11.150 --> 00:30:16.426 and he did that sometimes to a fault. I thought, do you have an example of 00:30:16.459 --> 00:30:24.459 that? Yes. One specific example, there was a project that required close 00:30:26.868 --> 00:30:32.575 co ordination with Washington in terms of these grants and financial 00:30:32.608 --> 00:30:40.456 programs. And he, he led the charge on that. It was very, very successful. 00:30:40.489 --> 00:30:44.266 Well, at the end of that period, there was a banquet. I don't know what 00:30:44.299 --> 00:30:51.877 we were celebrated. And the master ceremony mentioned this achievement and 00:30:51.910 --> 00:30:56.617 gave credit to uh Jack Williams. Well, when it came time for Jack Williams 00:30:56.650 --> 00:31:03.946 to respond, he, he said that that was not. So it was the legislature that 00:31:03.979 --> 00:31:11.367 should have the credit and his participation was not to stand in the way. 00:31:11.400 --> 00:31:13.766 Wow, 00:31:13.799 --> 00:31:21.799 later I remonstrated with him. I said that wasn't. So you handled this 00:31:22.338 --> 00:31:30.107 thing from day one and did it well, then he said, he said, Frank, 00:31:30.140 --> 00:31:35.585 technically, you're right. But having done what I did, you'd be surprised 00:31:35.618 --> 00:31:39.857 how much more cooper I can get from the legislature. 00:31:39.890 --> 00:31:45.305 And do you remember what project that was? Uh, it was a financial project 00:31:45.338 --> 00:31:50.717 of some kind involving uh programs that the federal government was giving 00:31:50.750 --> 00:31:57.406 to uh the various states. A lot of these programs were demonstration 00:31:57.439 --> 00:32:01.367 programs, the federal government 00:32:01.400 --> 00:32:09.400 fund them and fund them very generously. And when they were ongoing, the 00:32:09.750 --> 00:32:16.377 federal government was withdrawal and the states were picking up, 00:32:16.410 --> 00:32:24.410 when did you first get involved with a U, uh, when Jack Williams left 00:32:26.358 --> 00:32:31.516 office, he had been governor of that eight years. He left, he left the 00:32:31.549 --> 00:32:39.156 office. I wonder, what am I going to do with myself? I, I still was active 00:32:39.189 --> 00:32:46.565 and want to do something. So I picked up the G I Bill, 00:32:46.598 --> 00:32:54.598 went back to school to a su and picked up a Masters and a doctorate right 00:32:55.000 --> 00:33:03.000 here. And when I finished, um they were looking for a um 00:33:04.680 --> 00:33:12.680 uh a finance person which Brett Brown was doing who that was assigned to 00:33:15.009 --> 00:33:21.305 the governor's office. So I filled the vacuum by taking the job and I 00:33:21.338 --> 00:33:23.857 became, 00:33:23.890 --> 00:33:30.256 I became a vice president for Business Affairs for, as U and what did you 00:33:30.289 --> 00:33:36.545 get your masters and phd in just for the record public administration 00:33:36.578 --> 00:33:40.805 and your bachelor's degree was from where 00:33:40.838 --> 00:33:46.736 uh College Park, Maryland, University of Maryland in, in what I had 00:33:46.769 --> 00:33:51.097 started at Northwest and never finished because the war intervened, but 00:33:51.130 --> 00:33:55.686 then later went back to College Park. So you never went back to the 00:33:55.719 --> 00:33:59.946 sciences that you liked so much as a boy? No, by that time I got involved 00:33:59.979 --> 00:34:05.476 in this public administration thing which I enjoy. What were some of the 00:34:05.509 --> 00:34:10.106 projects when you started working at ASU, what sort of issues were going 00:34:10.139 --> 00:34:17.796 on at that time? Um Well, one of the things, uh by the way, John uh Swa 00:34:17.829 --> 00:34:22.756 swa was uh president 00:34:22.789 --> 00:34:30.789 just before Russell Nelson took it over and the board of Regents were 00:34:31.219 --> 00:34:38.046 after him to develop a new college. Their reasoning was very interesting 00:34:38.079 --> 00:34:44.706 and they pointed out that uh the College of Business was doing a great job 00:34:44.739 --> 00:34:47.046 in outreach, 00:34:47.079 --> 00:34:55.079 giving its knowledge to the people with various programs. And um that 00:34:56.789 --> 00:35:00.106 there was a 00:35:00.139 --> 00:35:08.139 no comparable program that uh worked on public administration 00:35:09.878 --> 00:35:17.878 in the communities where they could use some help. So um they decided what 00:35:17.978 --> 00:35:24.586 they needed was a college of public programs. 00:35:24.619 --> 00:35:32.619 And um I was asked by John Schwer if I would establish such a uh a college. 00:35:34.889 --> 00:35:36.889 And, and I did, it wasn't an easy job because I needed a minimum of five 00:35:40.688 --> 00:35:47.296 departments to make a college. And so we had to pick, we picked up what is 00:35:47.329 --> 00:35:53.747 now the Cronkite School of Journalism, uh the Department of Communication 00:35:53.780 --> 00:36:00.557 and just the studies and these departments were reluctant to leave their 00:36:00.590 --> 00:36:06.727 home to go into this brand new college. So we had a job of selling the 00:36:06.760 --> 00:36:14.760 program uh which wasn't easy to do. But uh we finally did it, 00:36:16.389 --> 00:36:19.646 was there similar kinds of programs at other colleges or was this 00:36:19.679 --> 00:36:25.046 something new? Yes, we called it the college of public programs and other 00:36:25.079 --> 00:36:29.615 colleges. They called it the College of Public Affairs. We didn't use that 00:36:29.648 --> 00:36:35.807 term because we already had a Department of Public Affairs 00:36:35.840 --> 00:36:41.865 which uh Brett had and organized 00:36:41.898 --> 00:36:45.186 that must have been challenging, starting up the whole new college. It was 00:36:45.219 --> 00:36:51.646 , it was a challenge. As a matter of fact, I talked to the president at 00:36:51.679 --> 00:36:56.416 that time. You know, why me? I was kind of relatively new here and they 00:36:56.449 --> 00:36:59.646 had all these um 00:36:59.679 --> 00:37:07.626 senior tenure professors, you know, 2025 30 year service. And I did ask 00:37:07.659 --> 00:37:13.497 him, I said, I'm delighted to do it. It's a challenge. But I'm curious, 00:37:13.530 --> 00:37:20.436 you know, why some senior person didn't take it? The answer I got is uh, 00:37:20.469 --> 00:37:24.675 was offered to them, but they all thought it was a high risk proposition. 00:37:24.708 --> 00:37:30.845 And you see what? It's an interesting thought here. When you're a tenured 00:37:30.878 --> 00:37:38.878 senior professor with 25 30 35 year service, you're very comfortable. 00:37:39.719 --> 00:37:45.885 You're sort of a king in the academic field. And uh there's a reluctance 00:37:45.918 --> 00:37:53.856 to take on challenging assignments that might uh screw up. You see, 00:37:53.889 --> 00:38:00.155 so you were the new guy that didn't mind. I think the impression I got is 00:38:00.188 --> 00:38:04.217 President Schwer was telling me really, you have nothing to lose. I had 00:38:04.250 --> 00:38:09.526 been through my career already and perhaps he was right about that. You 00:38:09.559 --> 00:38:14.546 were here then in the early seventies, was that some of the Vietnam war 00:38:14.579 --> 00:38:18.307 protests were still going on and that the Vietnam War was still being 00:38:18.340 --> 00:38:23.405 protested at the time you were here. It was, it was, what do you remember 00:38:23.438 --> 00:38:27.227 about that period? 00:38:27.260 --> 00:38:30.385 The uh 00:38:30.418 --> 00:38:38.115 we had a lot of unrest on the campus. Of course, because the students, 00:38:38.148 --> 00:38:44.796 I had some strong views about the, the war in general. And of course, the 00:38:44.829 --> 00:38:50.126 general view is, uh, we didn't belong there, we should get out. And I 00:38:50.159 --> 00:38:54.385 thought the same thing, it was a bad war in the wrong place. We were 00:38:54.418 --> 00:39:01.166 fighting the wrong enemy. And um, many years later, President Johnson and 00:39:01.199 --> 00:39:06.717 his memoirs said the same thing that must have been an unusual position as 00:39:06.750 --> 00:39:14.345 an ex military person to, for you because I know by that time my combat 00:39:14.378 --> 00:39:20.546 days were over. So I was not assigned to the region, but Jack Williams was 00:39:20.579 --> 00:39:26.396 a strong supporter of the war. He was a strong supporter of not of the war 00:39:26.429 --> 00:39:33.146 so much as of the administration that supported the war. He was very loyal 00:39:33.179 --> 00:39:40.905 to the administration. Mhm. Ok. Um So you, you've had a number of careers 00:39:40.938 --> 00:39:46.827 or jobs here at the university, that first one, you know, with the College 00:39:46.860 --> 00:39:52.695 of public programs. Um Let's talk about some of the other things that you 00:39:52.728 --> 00:39:59.236 did. Um after Russell Nelson came. Do you remember him coming? Yeah, I 00:39:59.269 --> 00:40:05.066 believe it was either Mulholland, the Provost Mulholland was the provost 00:40:05.099 --> 00:40:10.436 or uh uh President Russell Nelson. 00:40:10.469 --> 00:40:16.747 Oh, wanted a strategic planning. 00:40:16.780 --> 00:40:24.517 The department, we did not have any strategic planning and uh the uh melt 00:40:24.550 --> 00:40:28.467 Holland was very strong about planning ahead and understanding where we 00:40:28.500 --> 00:40:33.526 were and where we were going. So I was asked to uh develop a uh 00:40:33.559 --> 00:40:38.747 organization and agency of a strategic planning. That was, that was an 00:40:38.780 --> 00:40:44.925 interesting assignment and I did enjoy that. Of course, my love was on the 00:40:44.958 --> 00:40:51.256 faculty and uh I uh also made the provision when I got these assignments 00:40:51.289 --> 00:40:58.396 that I would, could be permitted to teach. Although I couldn't teach more 00:40:58.429 --> 00:41:05.356 than one subject a semester with the load, but I was able to do that. So 00:41:05.389 --> 00:41:10.385 the entire time I've been at the university, including today, 00:41:10.418 --> 00:41:18.327 I teach a minimum of one subject, one class per semester. Why did you want 00:41:18.360 --> 00:41:23.037 to teach? Uh 00:41:23.070 --> 00:41:30.135 I like it. I love teaching. I love the interaction with the younger 00:41:30.168 --> 00:41:37.316 generation because they are all so much younger than I am. And I like the 00:41:37.349 --> 00:41:43.756 idea that we in our discussions, we exchange values of their generation 00:41:43.789 --> 00:41:49.026 and my generation. And it's the interaction with the young people that uh 00:41:49.059 --> 00:41:54.236 is very attractive. Well, and you've seen several generations in your time 00:41:54.269 --> 00:42:00.986 here. How do they compare? Well, um 00:42:01.019 --> 00:42:04.175 in my generation, 00:42:04.208 --> 00:42:09.655 we adhere to the traditional values 00:42:09.688 --> 00:42:13.175 which we learned from our parents. 00:42:13.208 --> 00:42:19.537 The new generation is more innovative. They want to branch out, they want 00:42:19.570 --> 00:42:26.717 to innovate, they want to experiment, they want to try something new. 00:42:26.750 --> 00:42:33.537 And I think a lot of that, of course, is the influence of uh electronics 00:42:33.570 --> 00:42:35.807 television 00:42:35.840 --> 00:42:43.086 and uh the internet that stimulates you that there's so much material 00:42:43.119 --> 00:42:49.077 there. And the younger generation of course is right in the midst of that 00:42:49.110 --> 00:42:51.925 you also taught that middle generation, the one they call the baby boomer 00:42:51.958 --> 00:42:57.017 generation. How were they different? Well, 00:42:57.050 --> 00:43:02.206 I guess the baby boomers are between me and the new generation. 00:43:02.239 --> 00:43:08.977 Uh I, I pick the baby boomers of uh as a group are solid because they are 00:43:09.010 --> 00:43:15.595 products of the depression and they understand hard times, they understand 00:43:15.628 --> 00:43:21.236 uh fundamental things like the value of work, the work ethic. 00:43:21.269 --> 00:43:26.865 That's, and then the new generation, they don't understand that work, work 00:43:26.898 --> 00:43:34.066 ethic in the same way. Uh, they, uh, I think they do it because they have 00:43:34.099 --> 00:43:38.936 to do it but they don't appreciate it as much as those who were raised in 00:43:38.969 --> 00:43:45.416 the, in the depression. Remember, I said some, a little time ago, the most 00:43:45.449 --> 00:43:51.106 priceless thing during the depression was a job having a job because 25% 00:43:51.139 --> 00:43:59.139 of the eligible personnel did not have a job. Mhm. So young people today 00:43:59.199 --> 00:44:05.566 don't value a job in the same way. Right. I, I think of the modern 00:44:05.599 --> 00:44:12.606 generation that was the job because it is a livelihood and, uh, they value 00:44:12.639 --> 00:44:16.517 a job because it's a challenge and they innovate and maybe change the 00:44:16.550 --> 00:44:22.546 parameters and, and make it a better place. 00:44:22.579 --> 00:44:26.385 Let's go back and talk a little bit more about Russell Nelson when he 00:44:26.418 --> 00:44:30.195 first came here. What did, what did you think of him when he first arrived 00:44:30.228 --> 00:44:38.228 ? He was different from other presidents. He was different and, um, 00:44:40.489 --> 00:44:48.489 wanted to um make changes. There's one thing he was president during a 00:44:49.179 --> 00:44:53.486 period of great growth. 00:44:53.519 --> 00:44:59.967 If you char the growth of a su now the largest university in the United 00:45:00.000 --> 00:45:05.276 States. And that's only the main campus. By the way. If you chart it, 00:45:05.309 --> 00:45:13.195 you'll find when President Russell Nelson was here, it jumped and he had 00:45:13.228 --> 00:45:21.228 to manage it and uh to help manage it, he appointed me special assistant 00:45:23.320 --> 00:45:29.296 to him and that's, and, and then I had other jobs with them. But each time 00:45:29.329 --> 00:45:34.905 I said, but you must continue, you must permit me to teach, continue to 00:45:34.938 --> 00:45:38.327 teach. And they would all agree. 00:45:38.360 --> 00:45:42.106 Although I would work during the day and then teach at night. So I don't 00:45:42.139 --> 00:45:46.365 know that that was a good bargain. But, uh, sounds like they got double 00:45:46.398 --> 00:45:52.756 duty from you. But in those days in public administration, my discipline, 00:45:52.789 --> 00:45:58.405 a lot of the uh classes were at night because we were teaching, uh, master 00:45:58.438 --> 00:46:01.236 and doctoral students. 00:46:01.269 --> 00:46:06.247 So we had a lot of night classes and a lot of them were in the workforce. 00:46:06.280 --> 00:46:09.655 That was the time they could come to school. 00:46:09.688 --> 00:46:12.885 One of the things that happened during Russell Nelson's term as president 00:46:12.918 --> 00:46:18.445 was some of the problems with the sports department and you got involved 00:46:18.478 --> 00:46:20.986 with sports, 00:46:21.019 --> 00:46:25.606 the sports department here at the university. You got involved with the 00:46:25.639 --> 00:46:31.276 sports department, didn't you? For a while, 00:46:31.309 --> 00:46:36.186 uh, mentioned one incident, uh, uh, of the problem that, that, that'll 00:46:36.219 --> 00:46:42.006 trigger my memory. Well, with the NCAA. 00:46:42.039 --> 00:46:45.727 Oh, yeah. Yep. 00:46:45.760 --> 00:46:50.106 Uh, that was one of the sad experiences. That's why I, I learned to forget 00:46:50.139 --> 00:46:52.767 it. 00:46:52.800 --> 00:46:54.997 Um, 00:46:55.030 --> 00:47:02.767 we were under five violations of the NCAA basketball, men's track, women's 00:47:02.800 --> 00:47:05.635 track 00:47:05.668 --> 00:47:10.807 and baseball and one other. 00:47:10.840 --> 00:47:13.006 And so, 00:47:13.039 --> 00:47:20.296 and at that time I was special assistant to Russ. He said, would you go 00:47:20.329 --> 00:47:24.175 down to the Air Strike Department 00:47:24.208 --> 00:47:31.077 and find out what's going on? What's, what's the difficulty? 00:47:31.110 --> 00:47:37.095 And he said, in order to give you status, I'll appoint you assistant 00:47:37.128 --> 00:47:42.977 director. So I was assistant director to Dick Tamburo, who was the 00:47:43.010 --> 00:47:50.095 athletic director. So I spent six months, uh reviewing interviewing, 00:47:50.128 --> 00:47:57.506 studying that I reported to the, um president, what the problem was and he 00:47:57.539 --> 00:48:03.385 asked, is it uh correctable? 00:48:03.418 --> 00:48:06.885 And I said, not with the president administration because we have a 00:48:06.918 --> 00:48:10.467 culture problem there. 00:48:10.500 --> 00:48:15.537 What's that? I said, what we have done in the athletic department, we have 00:48:15.570 --> 00:48:21.675 given the coaches a lot more authority than they should have without a 00:48:21.708 --> 00:48:26.425 control mechanism. 00:48:26.458 --> 00:48:33.195 And so we've developed a culture favoring cultures 00:48:33.228 --> 00:48:37.526 and uh 00:48:37.559 --> 00:48:44.135 their objective is to win and sometimes they stretch the regulation and 00:48:44.168 --> 00:48:48.146 they get caught doing it. 00:48:48.179 --> 00:48:52.416 So he sat down, 00:48:52.449 --> 00:48:57.307 can we correct? It said not under the president administration. Well, then 00:48:57.340 --> 00:49:02.477 he did a very surprising thing. He the fire Dick Da Burro and made me the 00:49:02.510 --> 00:49:08.066 athletic director. He said straighten it out. 00:49:08.099 --> 00:49:14.256 That was a quick solution from his point. Of view. I did but you know how 00:49:14.289 --> 00:49:19.747 I did it, I simply fired all the coaches 00:49:19.780 --> 00:49:24.086 and you had the power to do that. I had the power to do that. That isn't 00:49:24.119 --> 00:49:27.175 as easy as it sounds 00:49:27.208 --> 00:49:34.046 because when you fire a coach, you fire his or her entire staff because 00:49:34.079 --> 00:49:38.977 the new coach will bring a new staff. So you fire the secretaries and the 00:49:39.010 --> 00:49:43.316 work studies. You fire the whole thing, 00:49:43.349 --> 00:49:48.956 But I had been through this firing thing in the military after you 00:49:48.989 --> 00:49:54.997 accomplish your mission in this firing, which is a nasty business. Then 00:49:55.030 --> 00:49:57.896 you can become generous. 00:49:57.929 --> 00:50:05.376 That's a trick in firing. You have the ax fall and then you become 00:50:05.409 --> 00:50:10.666 generous as generous as you can. For example, I continued all the 00:50:10.699 --> 00:50:12.936 terminations 00:50:12.969 --> 00:50:16.307 with six months pay 00:50:16.340 --> 00:50:20.037 and for the professionals like the coaches and the assistant coaches, I 00:50:20.070 --> 00:50:27.566 provided officers secretarial help and employment agency, assistant picked 00:50:27.599 --> 00:50:33.997 up the tab for all of that so that they could get a job and most of them 00:50:34.030 --> 00:50:39.175 did in six months. And then I continued the health insurance for one year 00:50:39.208 --> 00:50:44.836 because the families all depended on health insurance. So we continued 00:50:44.869 --> 00:50:48.477 that for one year for everybody 00:50:48.510 --> 00:50:55.666 and uh that worked out, ok? And we finally straightened it out. Uh Only 00:50:55.699 --> 00:51:03.577 one bad reaction. Um We Meyer who was the basketball coach came to see me 00:51:03.610 --> 00:51:10.686 and said, you can't follow me. And I asked why he said, uh because I have 00:51:10.719 --> 00:51:14.217 a contract. I said I do. I know that it's a one year contract. That was 00:51:14.250 --> 00:51:18.126 the rule, you could give only one year contracts. So I'm, I'm firing you 00:51:18.159 --> 00:51:24.695 at the end of your contract period. But he said I got a five year contract. 00:51:24.728 --> 00:51:28.736 I said, no, you don't have a five year contract because we're not given 00:51:28.769 --> 00:51:32.787 five year contracts. Well, what did that bureau had done to keep him? He 00:51:32.820 --> 00:51:40.566 was a good coach. He had given him five consecutive one year contracts 00:51:40.599 --> 00:51:48.166 while it was illegal on the face of it, both by the, the giver and the 00:51:48.199 --> 00:51:56.199 taker. So I said, I'm firing you anyway. Well, he sued me and he had a 00:51:57.389 --> 00:52:02.155 good case because he had the evidence. So we finally settled for half a 00:52:02.188 --> 00:52:06.706 million dollars and got out of it that way. 00:52:06.739 --> 00:52:09.856 That's one lesson I've learned over the years. If you can solve the 00:52:09.889 --> 00:52:16.655 problem with money, do it? Get back, get behind you. So then you had to 00:52:16.688 --> 00:52:22.865 hire a bunch of new coaches. Uh, I, I didn't do that. We, uh, uh, needed a 00:52:22.898 --> 00:52:27.675 lot of new coaches and I was phasing out. It was time for me to get out. I 00:52:27.708 --> 00:52:32.977 wanted to go back to the faculty full time and, uh, Harris was coming in, 00:52:33.010 --> 00:52:40.526 I think Charles Harris. Uh, and so I said, let Charles Harris do it. So 00:52:40.559 --> 00:52:45.267 the new coach came in, the new aircraft director came in and did it and 00:52:45.300 --> 00:52:49.046 you went. Where did you go from there? Well, I went back to the college of 00:52:49.079 --> 00:52:56.066 public programs and continued teaching, which is what I, why I came to the 00:52:56.099 --> 00:53:00.186 university in the first place. It seems like they used you for a lot of 00:53:00.219 --> 00:53:03.227 other things. So, whenever there was a problem you were the one they went 00:53:03.260 --> 00:53:08.086 to. Yeah, I, I was, uh, pleased to do it, uh, as a result of these 00:53:08.119 --> 00:53:14.566 activities, uh, my department presented me with a, um, a fire helmet 00:53:14.599 --> 00:53:21.756 painted red on the basis that I was skilled in putting out fires. And I 00:53:21.789 --> 00:53:25.925 have it hanging on the wall of my office. 00:53:25.958 --> 00:53:32.236 That's great. Um, do you want to talk about any of the other challenges 00:53:32.269 --> 00:53:36.175 that you had of putting out fires in the university? 00:53:36.208 --> 00:53:40.706 I think those were the major ones. 00:53:40.739 --> 00:53:47.195 Um, so in teaching the students, what sort of advice do you give the young 00:53:47.228 --> 00:53:50.506 people today that are trying to decide what they want to do with their 00:53:50.539 --> 00:53:57.206 lives? There's a lot of opportunity to interact with them at the breaks 00:53:57.239 --> 00:54:01.925 and the lunch period. At the present time, I'm teaching on Saturday, six 00:54:01.958 --> 00:54:06.816 days, six hours a day, three hours for one class, we break for lunch for 00:54:06.849 --> 00:54:11.327 one hour and then another three hours and we do it every other Saturday. 00:54:11.360 --> 00:54:18.586 Uh, during that time, I have a lot of opportunity to rap with them. And so 00:54:18.619 --> 00:54:25.106 I invariably ask them what their career goals are and uh and, and that's 00:54:25.139 --> 00:54:32.626 quite revealing as to what uh as they perceive their future. Now, one of 00:54:32.659 --> 00:54:37.126 the things I do in all my classes, I asked students to prepare a five 00:54:37.159 --> 00:54:43.865 minute talk about themselves and I wanted to in three parts, part one is 00:54:43.898 --> 00:54:49.227 their background where they come from their youth. Second, what are they 00:54:49.260 --> 00:54:54.086 doing today? And then the third part is what are their career goals? Where 00:54:54.119 --> 00:54:58.967 are they going tomorrow? And that's that some of them thinking that may 00:54:59.000 --> 00:55:04.595 not, may not have thought about it before. And I think the uh asking of 00:55:04.628 --> 00:55:10.247 the Kels is very important. Now, I also monitor some doctoral students and 00:55:10.280 --> 00:55:16.686 I work with them and um I asked them the same question, well, about uh 00:55:16.719 --> 00:55:24.719 half of them roughly and even 50% want to go into teaching, 50% want to go 00:55:26.228 --> 00:55:29.345 into administration. 00:55:29.378 --> 00:55:34.345 Now, that's interesting to me because when you go into teaching, right, 00:55:34.378 --> 00:55:41.486 from achieving a doctorate, you're entering a life of genteel poverty, 00:55:41.519 --> 00:55:49.396 you have to go through five years of 10 year evaluation and then you get 00:55:49.429 --> 00:55:54.037 the tenure. If you're lucky at the end of five years, you start at about 00:55:54.070 --> 00:56:01.146 $32,000 a year and creep up and it is creepy. Or by if you elect to go to 00:56:01.179 --> 00:56:06.717 administration, you probably achieve a salary of 65 or $70,000 a year 00:56:06.750 --> 00:56:13.807 because there are not many doctorate graduates at city or state level in 00:56:13.840 --> 00:56:16.747 public administration. 00:56:16.780 --> 00:56:23.467 But it's interesting that 50% do have the, uh, the love of teaching and 00:56:23.500 --> 00:56:28.557 want to be a teacher that's very heartwarming. 00:56:28.590 --> 00:56:35.896 What sort of advice do you give them? Thank you. Uh, 00:56:35.929 --> 00:56:40.646 I, I try not to um 00:56:40.679 --> 00:56:48.679 develop their career in any way. And, uh I'm very, very, uh broad in that 00:56:48.978 --> 00:56:56.978 , on that question. I uh, tell them, listen, spend more time listening. 00:56:58.829 --> 00:57:02.287 Then you do talking, 00:57:02.320 --> 00:57:08.526 keep your, um, lectures to a minimum. 00:57:08.559 --> 00:57:13.776 People don't learn from lectures. I learned that people don't learn from 00:57:13.809 --> 00:57:21.809 the textbook really. So I advise them to take the textbook, excuse me 00:57:22.628 --> 00:57:29.526 and uh, develop the lessons of the text into case studies and then have 00:57:29.559 --> 00:57:34.506 them solve the case study. 00:57:34.539 --> 00:57:38.986 Now to solve a case study, you must know the entire background of what 00:57:39.019 --> 00:57:45.717 went into that case. And in this instance, it would be the textbooks. 00:57:45.750 --> 00:57:51.267 See the lessened areas. Let the student do the work, don't you do the work 00:57:51.300 --> 00:57:53.566 ? 00:57:53.599 --> 00:57:59.695 So what I do in class, I listen to the, um, students tell me how they've 00:57:59.728 --> 00:58:06.385 solved the case and I can tell how well they've absorbed the literature to 00:58:06.418 --> 00:58:11.655 make it more interesting. If I have nine students or uh, 12, I form teams 00:58:11.688 --> 00:58:15.345 of teams of three. 00:58:15.378 --> 00:58:19.756 And then I have the teams compete with each other as to which team does 00:58:19.789 --> 00:58:27.789 the best job and who judges that I do. 00:58:27.969 --> 00:58:34.497 This is tape two with Frank Sac and I'm Pam Stevenson. Um, let's see, 00:58:34.530 --> 00:58:38.945 let's go back and talk a little bit more about your coming out to a U. Um 00:58:38.978 --> 00:58:45.816 , you came as a student first but, um, you're first working here, you were 00:58:45.849 --> 00:58:48.796 talking a little about salaries that people get today. What kind of 00:58:48.829 --> 00:58:53.445 salaries did you get when you first came out here? 00:58:53.478 --> 00:59:01.478 I remember distinctly $18,000 a year for, uh, 00:59:01.949 --> 00:59:07.856 for an academic year. Not very much because I was used to work for a 00:59:07.889 --> 00:59:14.217 salary as a three star general in the army. However, the salary wasn't the 00:59:14.250 --> 00:59:22.250 important thing. By the way, my salary today, when I asked to continue 00:59:22.938 --> 00:59:30.938 teaching, I saw, um, and Milton Glick, he was a president then and he said 00:59:31.820 --> 00:59:38.856 , uh, well, let's negotiate salary. And I said, look, salary isn't a 00:59:38.889 --> 00:59:43.365 problem. Why don't we make it 25% 00:59:43.398 --> 00:59:48.606 of, um, what is a professor? 00:59:48.639 --> 00:59:51.675 He said, well, that's quite generous. So he made it 25% and you know what 00:59:51.708 --> 00:59:59.708 , that amounts to just about $18,000 a year, huh? Just like I started, but 01:00:00.599 --> 01:00:05.267 you're only teaching one class or, you know, two classes, I guess. Um, 01:00:05.300 --> 01:00:08.517 where, where were your first classes? Where, what part of campus were you 01:00:08.550 --> 01:00:12.747 located on? We started by first classes. We in the Social sciences 01:00:12.780 --> 01:00:15.756 building 01:00:15.789 --> 01:00:21.517 and then we moved to, um, the headquarters, moved to Wilson Hall and since 01:00:21.550 --> 01:00:28.327 then we've been all over the lot. My best of classrooms. I think are in 01:00:28.360 --> 01:00:31.046 West Hall, 01:00:31.079 --> 01:00:37.425 beautiful classrooms. Is that where you are now? 01:00:37.458 --> 01:00:42.936 Um And you sort of started your own department then right after you were, 01:00:42.969 --> 01:00:48.526 um, let's see, we asked people about who their first boss was here on 01:00:48.559 --> 01:00:52.217 campus. Do you remember who you reported to when you started working here 01:00:52.250 --> 01:01:00.250 ? The first one was Brett Brown. He was at the director of the, that new 01:01:00.398 --> 01:01:08.398 thing they did, the, the Center for Public Affairs. What happened 01:01:09.250 --> 01:01:11.807 DF 01:01:11.840 --> 01:01:19.557 Political Science. People had both political science and a public 01:01:19.590 --> 01:01:24.856 administration teaching thing. And they did think that was harmonious. 01:01:24.889 --> 01:01:32.889 They wanted to be only political scientists. So they broke it off and made 01:01:33.139 --> 01:01:40.017 it a separate department at that time, they called it a center. So then 01:01:40.050 --> 01:01:44.666 they began asking who would want to take it. None of the professors were 01:01:44.699 --> 01:01:46.686 interested. 01:01:46.719 --> 01:01:53.517 And uh Brett Brown had just shown up into the political Science. So they 01:01:53.550 --> 01:02:01.365 simply appointed him to take over the new department. 01:02:01.398 --> 01:02:06.566 So you've known Brett Brown a long time then, haven't you? Yes, I, he was 01:02:06.599 --> 01:02:09.717 really the first one I reported to. As a matter of fact, I reported to him 01:02:09.750 --> 01:02:15.115 before he took the department, I had left the governor's office and was 01:02:15.148 --> 01:02:20.376 interested in coming back to school and came to him for advice. He was in 01:02:20.409 --> 01:02:24.365 charge of the discipline that I was interested in public administration. 01:02:24.398 --> 01:02:32.398 So he advised me about the, uh about uh taking courses and I did and then 01:02:32.530 --> 01:02:40.336 uh appointed me up a teaching assistant to him. So I became Brett Brown's 01:02:40.369 --> 01:02:43.436 teaching assistant. 01:02:43.469 --> 01:02:48.856 That was a pretty distinguished teaching assistant. I would say 01:02:48.889 --> 01:02:54.577 Brown was a good boss. He permitted me to do a good deal of teaching. So 01:02:54.610 --> 01:02:57.686 would you say then he's the one that was responsible for you really coming 01:02:57.719 --> 01:03:01.845 out to a su 01:03:01.878 --> 01:03:07.506 not responsible for my coming but responsible as the first person to lead 01:03:07.539 --> 01:03:11.695 the way as to what I should do. 01:03:11.728 --> 01:03:14.945 Who were some of the other people that were here at that time? You came 01:03:14.978 --> 01:03:19.967 here that uh John Hall was here 01:03:20.000 --> 01:03:24.126 and um 01:03:24.159 --> 01:03:30.227 there was one author in the department. I I don't recall. 01:03:30.260 --> 01:03:37.095 Of course. Then we filled up with people like Dick Revis who's now Dean of 01:03:37.128 --> 01:03:43.816 the School of Architecture at the U of A. Uh he, he was a freshly minted 01:03:43.849 --> 01:03:50.236 uh A phd from University of Southern California when he came to work for 01:03:50.269 --> 01:03:54.396 us. 01:03:54.429 --> 01:04:00.336 Those were the important ones. Uh Dicker Revis and John Hall, 01:04:00.369 --> 01:04:03.017 you've worked pretty closely with all the presidents. You talked a little 01:04:03.050 --> 01:04:07.997 about Russell Nelson. You remember when Laddie Core came? Um What, what 01:04:08.030 --> 01:04:12.865 did you think about Lady? Your first impression? I, I enjoyed working for 01:04:12.898 --> 01:04:17.445 uh Lady Core. Lady Core 01:04:17.478 --> 01:04:22.345 was interested in my basic discipline, finance within public 01:04:22.378 --> 01:04:28.945 administration. So he put me to work to uh compare 01:04:28.978 --> 01:04:35.655 our system and our budget with other universities, particularly in 01:04:35.688 --> 01:04:43.688 California. So I, I made these studies for him in terms of, um, uh, uh, 01:04:44.869 --> 01:04:49.236 money and finance and appropriation. 01:04:49.269 --> 01:04:55.695 And he also, uh, was interested in how best to approach you see, to get 01:04:55.728 --> 01:05:02.787 money in a department like ours. You had to sell the program to, uh, the 01:05:02.820 --> 01:05:07.267 legislature and then you'd have to go through the appropriation committees 01:05:07.300 --> 01:05:12.155 first, the House and then the, uh, the Senate. 01:05:12.188 --> 01:05:17.756 And, uh, so he put me to work on the strategy and, and by the way, I'm 01:05:17.789 --> 01:05:23.376 familiar with that subject. And what I advised him, what I had learned is 01:05:23.409 --> 01:05:28.135 and not go before these committees alone and ask for money because they 01:05:28.168 --> 01:05:33.945 know you're an interested party. And they uh take that into consideration 01:05:33.978 --> 01:05:37.086 as to whether they will give you the money or not, but to develop a 01:05:37.119 --> 01:05:39.425 constituency 01:05:39.458 --> 01:05:46.856 that will help you get the money. So he asked, uh can you mention some 01:05:46.889 --> 01:05:50.356 names? I said, yeah, one is Jack Feaster. Jack Feaster used to volunteer 01:05:50.389 --> 01:05:53.577 to teach for us for free. 01:05:53.610 --> 01:05:59.796 He was a newly appointed as a manager of the Salt River project. So he was 01:05:59.829 --> 01:06:07.727 , they knew they didn't know me or they didn't know the faculty, but they 01:06:07.760 --> 01:06:15.760 knew J Feaster. Then we had um to others. So when we asked for money, we 01:06:16.530 --> 01:06:23.106 only introduced the subject and then the constituency well known to the 01:06:23.139 --> 01:06:27.876 panel would make the case for us. Of course, back in those days, the 01:06:27.909 --> 01:06:32.477 legislature was a lot different than it is today too, wasn't it? It was 01:06:32.510 --> 01:06:37.986 different. The big difference. 01:06:38.019 --> 01:06:46.019 It is a maturity when I came here early on, the legislature was controlled 01:06:47.309 --> 01:06:53.135 pretty much by the old boys network 01:06:53.168 --> 01:07:00.467 because we were a small state and, and people knew each other. So the old 01:07:00.500 --> 01:07:05.606 boys network came into play, uh, that, of course, has changed now, it's 01:07:05.639 --> 01:07:08.247 very professional 01:07:08.280 --> 01:07:15.006 who were some of the, the old boys that, that you worked with. Uh, the, uh 01:07:15.039 --> 01:07:20.967 , 01:07:21.000 --> 01:07:25.247 I never was part of the network. The people I worked with were not part of 01:07:25.280 --> 01:07:31.477 the network, either Brett Brown or John Hall. They were not part of this 01:07:31.510 --> 01:07:36.046 network. Is that the period when, um, Burton Barr and Stan Turley and 01:07:36.079 --> 01:07:39.135 people like that were there, 01:07:39.168 --> 01:07:46.967 it was a and not only in this network, he controlled it, 01:07:47.000 --> 01:07:53.695 uh, we learned in the budget business, uh to get Burt Bar on our side as 01:07:53.728 --> 01:07:59.787 quickly as we could because he was very helpful. He was very helpful. Not 01:07:59.820 --> 01:08:04.445 only with the legislature, he was helpful in any enterprise involving 01:08:04.478 --> 01:08:10.365 state government. Mhm. Yeah. Did you get much involved in politics or did 01:08:10.398 --> 01:08:16.826 you try to stay out of that? I tried to stay out of it, but I went to work 01:08:16.859 --> 01:08:19.816 for Governor Jack Williams. 01:08:19.849 --> 01:08:24.106 He made that point directly. He said there are a lot of politics in this 01:08:24.139 --> 01:08:31.027 state but if you get involved in some kind of a discussion, duck, it 01:08:31.060 --> 01:08:33.515 responds 01:08:33.548 --> 01:08:37.816 probably good. Advice. Um, 01:08:37.849 --> 01:08:41.446 but you, you've seen the ch, the state change a lot since you and the 01:08:41.479 --> 01:08:48.175 university since you came. Right. I, I've been at the university, uh, 27 01:08:48.208 --> 01:08:52.237 years, the previous three years because I've been around 30 a little over 01:08:52.270 --> 01:08:56.765 30 years. I was with Governor Jack Williams, but I've been teaching about 01:08:56.798 --> 01:09:02.067 27 years. So I've been associated with the faculty in one way or another 01:09:02.100 --> 01:09:08.067 now for 27 years. And there has been a change there and the change has all 01:09:08.100 --> 01:09:15.357 been for the better. It's been a change to better professionalism 01:09:15.390 --> 01:09:23.036 in the conduct of our work. And the uh the classes uh show a immaturity. 01:09:23.069 --> 01:09:28.616 We do a lot more work. Like I mentioned the case study method instead of 01:09:28.649 --> 01:09:34.277 reading the textbook and getting examinations out of the textbook or 01:09:34.310 --> 01:09:41.416 lectures. I have learned that lectures are deadly. Stay away from lectures 01:09:41.449 --> 01:09:46.086 or make them very, very short. 01:09:46.119 --> 01:09:52.756 What do you feel is the most notable achievement that you have had at the 01:09:52.789 --> 01:09:56.027 university? 01:09:56.060 --> 01:10:01.046 I think the thing that, um 01:10:01.079 --> 01:10:08.916 I would have to judge the question between the athletic director and dean 01:10:08.949 --> 01:10:12.967 of the College of Public Programs. 01:10:13.000 --> 01:10:16.586 Uh They were both challenges 01:10:16.619 --> 01:10:23.916 and very rewarding after the challenge was solved. Maybe it's a tie 01:10:23.949 --> 01:10:26.976 between the two. 01:10:27.009 --> 01:10:32.286 How would you like to be remembered here? 01:10:32.319 --> 01:10:36.527 I think the way I'd like to be remembered that at 93 years of age, I'm 01:10:36.560 --> 01:10:40.357 still in the workforce trying to contribute. 01:10:40.390 --> 01:10:45.930 That's a pretty notable achievement. I think you're doing a good job of it.