WEBVTT 00:00:06.299 --> 00:00:08.299 Good morning. It's the 22nd day of April 2015. 00:00:11.319 --> 00:00:15.826 We're conducting an interview for the Arizona State University Retirees 00:00:15.859 --> 00:00:22.175 Association video History project. We are located today in the A SU 00:00:22.208 --> 00:00:27.605 Community Services building. I'm Gary Creen Bee. The technical support 00:00:27.638 --> 00:00:32.686 staff today include John mcintosh, operating the camera, Roger Carter 00:00:32.719 --> 00:00:39.296 handling the audio, Linda Van Goy director uh David sats chair of the 00:00:39.329 --> 00:00:44.116 video history project and we appreciate all of you contributing to this 00:00:44.149 --> 00:00:49.717 work. And now our interviewee, I'll have him introduce himself and uh tell 00:00:49.750 --> 00:00:55.967 us uh uh what position he held while he was at a su uh My name is Richard 00:00:56.000 --> 00:01:01.167 Peck. I came here as Provost in 1988 accidentally became interim president 00:01:01.200 --> 00:01:06.165 when Russ Nelson retired almost immediately after I arrived. And um I 00:01:06.198 --> 00:01:11.025 spent nine months in that job and during that time was nominated for a 00:01:11.058 --> 00:01:15.257 presidency elsewhere. So I left here to go to University of New Mexico 00:01:15.290 --> 00:01:19.066 where I retired after another 10 years 00:01:19.099 --> 00:01:23.165 and we'll get back to that uh because he couldn't stay retired. He uh 00:01:23.198 --> 00:01:29.665 actually found himself in some other positions um in retirement, I guess. 00:01:29.698 --> 00:01:31.766 Um 00:01:31.799 --> 00:01:34.967 Would you tell our viewers today a little bit about, uh, your early life 00:01:35.000 --> 00:01:39.796 where you grew up, what schools you attended? Um, and what, what led you 00:01:39.829 --> 00:01:44.967 to your academic career? I was born in Milwaukee, but my parents lived to 00:01:45.000 --> 00:01:49.796 Mo, lived in rural Wisconsin outside of Milwaukee. I had a wonderful break. 00:01:49.829 --> 00:01:53.426 I went to a two room country school. The first four grades were in one 00:01:53.459 --> 00:01:56.915 room. So one year I was in the first grade and the next year I was in the 00:01:56.948 --> 00:02:00.507 third grade and didn't notice the difference. I've been listening to the 00:02:00.540 --> 00:02:05.495 all the same lessons all day, every day. Um, and so I had a great 00:02:05.528 --> 00:02:10.327 experience in school. A couple of very good teachers and they, uh, let me 00:02:10.360 --> 00:02:14.126 continue kind of at my own pace and it was a great experience. I went 00:02:14.159 --> 00:02:18.106 through the first eight grades there, then moved to Tacoma briefly. My 00:02:18.139 --> 00:02:22.255 father moved west because of his health. We lived in Tacoma, Washington. 00:02:22.288 --> 00:02:28.866 Um, and then, um, I went back to Wisconsin to go to college. After five 00:02:28.899 --> 00:02:33.305 years in the Marine Corps. I worked in a foundry after, uh, high school 00:02:33.338 --> 00:02:36.055 and decided there was something better than that. I didn't know what it 00:02:36.088 --> 00:02:41.416 was enlisted in the Marine Corps. That was not it. Uh, but, but I had five 00:02:41.449 --> 00:02:46.517 good years in the Marine Corps and, and because of one of the most perfect 00:02:46.550 --> 00:02:50.786 federal bills ever, I got my college education. I went on the G I Bill and 00:02:50.819 --> 00:02:54.786 the G I Bill educated a lot of us, a lot of people who otherwise wouldn't 00:02:54.819 --> 00:02:59.696 have gone to school. I went to a small school in Wisconsin Carroll College 00:02:59.729 --> 00:03:04.237 and I was in the experiment. Uh Roanna Benjamin was the, I will name her. 00:03:04.270 --> 00:03:09.346 Now, thank you. Roanna was the registrar there and she accepted every 00:03:09.379 --> 00:03:12.886 year, a couple of what she called her spooks. Um She liked my letter. I 00:03:12.919 --> 00:03:15.856 wrote a letter saying I'm coming to college there in January. Should I do 00:03:15.889 --> 00:03:20.396 anything? I had no idea. No, nobody in my family had ever been to school. 00:03:20.429 --> 00:03:23.846 And she said, yes, you have to send us your SAT scores, college, your 00:03:23.879 --> 00:03:27.725 high school transcript and three letters of recommendation. So I wrote 00:03:27.758 --> 00:03:30.656 back and said, uh I don't have my grades. You ask my high school, they 00:03:30.689 --> 00:03:35.085 probably have them. I don't know what an SAT is and um, ask my mother, she 00:03:35.118 --> 00:03:39.346 give me some names for recommendation and I went to school and I found out 00:03:39.379 --> 00:03:42.876 years later she had done all those things and she put together my 00:03:42.909 --> 00:03:47.207 application form and accepted me there along with her other spook for the 00:03:47.240 --> 00:03:52.005 year was a man named Tom Josephson. Tom was a um shepherd in a line shack 00:03:52.038 --> 00:03:55.416 in Montana. He spent a couple of years reading, decided to go to school. 00:03:55.449 --> 00:04:00.755 So he applied to Carroll college. There is a Carroll college in Montana. 00:04:00.788 --> 00:04:05.566 The postal system being then what it is now sent his letter to the wrong 00:04:05.599 --> 00:04:08.517 carroll college. She sent it to the one in Wisconsin. And Ryan and 00:04:08.550 --> 00:04:12.106 Benjamin looked at and said, yeah, he's a good one. So she took him. So uh 00:04:12.139 --> 00:04:15.927 we were her two spooks that year. It was an accident. I shouldn't have 00:04:15.960 --> 00:04:22.217 been in school and I thank her to the day I die. Uh So it, it's a G I Bill 00:04:22.250 --> 00:04:25.967 and A and a couple of very interesting faculty members, went to graduate 00:04:26.000 --> 00:04:30.336 school at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. My first job was at the 00:04:30.369 --> 00:04:36.116 University of Virginia. Um then to Temple University for 15 years in 00:04:36.149 --> 00:04:41.437 Philadelphia. And I got on to an administrative track. I ended up, I was 00:04:41.470 --> 00:04:46.305 the head of a remedial writing program and then went to manage a Temple 00:04:46.338 --> 00:04:50.856 campus in Rome for two years. And so that experience got me nominated for 00:04:50.889 --> 00:04:54.236 a couple of administrative jobs. I was Dean of Arts and Sciences at 00:04:54.269 --> 00:04:59.705 Alabama Provost at Arizona State, interim President, Arizona State, then 00:04:59.738 --> 00:05:04.426 president at the University of New Mexico for 10 years, retired and became 00:05:04.459 --> 00:05:10.406 interim president of um University of South Florida in Tampa. I was there 00:05:10.439 --> 00:05:13.606 for eight months and, and as an interim, I learned something very 00:05:13.639 --> 00:05:16.986 interesting. Faculty members can hold their breath for eight months. Um 00:05:17.019 --> 00:05:20.366 They uh they know when you're coming in, they know when you're gonna leave. 00:05:20.399 --> 00:05:23.245 And so that end of the eight months in the middle, doesn't matter very 00:05:23.278 --> 00:05:27.757 much. Had a great experience, a nice place to be. But July came around and 00:05:27.790 --> 00:05:34.067 Tampa is not a place to be in July. So, uh, I finally retired and, uh, 00:05:34.100 --> 00:05:38.976 Gary said a minute ago, I, I keep doing things since retirement. I've had 00:05:39.009 --> 00:05:46.916 uh, 12 books and nine plays. And so I just got back last night from 00:05:46.949 --> 00:05:50.726 directing a play on Kawa. I was there for four months. wonderful 00:05:50.759 --> 00:05:57.366 experience, great excuse for a vacation and I still enjoy it. 00:05:57.399 --> 00:06:02.205 You walked us through your career. This, this interview focuses on your A 00:06:02.238 --> 00:06:08.687 SU years primarily. Um What attracted you to a su and uh and when exactly 00:06:08.720 --> 00:06:14.627 did you serve here, I came in um 88 and was here for only for two years. I 00:06:14.660 --> 00:06:19.705 came in uh in 88. And as I said, Russ Nelson, the president when I got 00:06:19.738 --> 00:06:25.067 here um had suffered a bout of um valley fever and he decided he had 00:06:25.100 --> 00:06:29.757 enough time in the job. And so he retired a few weeks after I got here, I 00:06:29.790 --> 00:06:33.637 finished off that year as Provost and then became interim president for 00:06:33.670 --> 00:06:40.245 another year at that time. Um I met Lady Co who hadn't yet come to campus 00:06:40.278 --> 00:06:43.926 and we talked a couple of times about the transition. I went to Vermont to 00:06:43.959 --> 00:06:49.166 meet with him and um it wasn't at all clear whether he would want me to 00:06:49.199 --> 00:06:53.036 continue in his administration or I would want to, I didn't know that. So 00:06:53.069 --> 00:06:57.106 I accepted the nomination to apply for a couple of other jobs and did and 00:06:57.139 --> 00:07:00.866 moved on. But I had two very good years here and I enjoyed the experience 00:07:00.899 --> 00:07:04.226 a lot. I learned a good bit. I learned a lot from Russ even in that short 00:07:04.259 --> 00:07:09.036 time that we were together. Uh One example, one of the departments was 00:07:09.069 --> 00:07:14.007 unhappy with the treatment they perceived to be receiving from the dean. I 00:07:14.040 --> 00:07:18.086 thought the dean was right. Um I thought the department was being 00:07:18.119 --> 00:07:21.406 unreasonable and I didn't know what to do about it. And Russ said, what 00:07:21.439 --> 00:07:24.567 you do about it is meet with everybody in the department, talk with them, 00:07:24.600 --> 00:07:28.765 listen to what their complaints are. So it was a substantially sized 00:07:28.798 --> 00:07:32.705 department. Let me guess, 30 people. I spent half an hour to an hour with 00:07:32.738 --> 00:07:37.036 each one of them and each one of them said the same thing he said, I'm ok. 00:07:37.069 --> 00:07:41.145 But these other guys are really unhappy with the deed and one at a time, 00:07:41.178 --> 00:07:46.546 they all declared their allegiance and also identified the rebels in the 00:07:46.579 --> 00:07:52.257 middle of their own department. And after all those conversations, the 00:07:52.290 --> 00:07:57.645 furor died down, uh things calmed down and uh we went on, the nice thing 00:07:57.678 --> 00:08:02.336 was when I left, I got a letter from the chairman of that department who 00:08:02.369 --> 00:08:06.305 thanked me, should have thanked Russ, thanked me for the conversations 00:08:06.338 --> 00:08:10.416 that we had and for simply listening to what they had to say. I didn't do 00:08:10.449 --> 00:08:15.127 anything about it frankly, but the people need to be here, heard. And I 00:08:15.160 --> 00:08:18.726 learned that because of Russ's advice, I thought at first he was wrong. 00:08:18.759 --> 00:08:22.226 Why am I gonna waste all that time listening to people who just want to 00:08:22.259 --> 00:08:26.586 complain, but it wasn't a waste of time and I learned a good bit about 00:08:26.619 --> 00:08:31.856 them and, uh, and it worked out well. So, um, Kudos to Russ Nelson for one 00:08:31.889 --> 00:08:36.486 of my lessons and there were others. Most of this interview will focus on 00:08:36.519 --> 00:08:40.726 uh the administration because that's what you were involved in. But um as 00:08:40.759 --> 00:08:44.645 I recall, you were a, a Mark Twain scholar or at least that was one of the 00:08:44.678 --> 00:08:48.287 , one of the things that you had focused on. Do you have a favorite Mark 00:08:48.320 --> 00:08:55.667 Twain story? Uh um Yes and not, not a story of that he wrote, but one of 00:08:55.700 --> 00:09:02.265 his letters always tickles me. He had um had the misfortune of having 00:09:02.298 --> 00:09:06.476 Huckleberry Finn stolen by a British publisher. There was no international 00:09:06.509 --> 00:09:10.417 copyright and one of Mark Twain's greatest achievements was to get an 00:09:10.450 --> 00:09:14.856 international copyright in place. But a British publisher published 00:09:14.889 --> 00:09:18.875 Huckleberry Finn without giving him anything and then shipped it to the US 00:09:18.908 --> 00:09:22.765 to be sold uh when that was not found to be legal, they shipped it to 00:09:22.798 --> 00:09:26.417 Canada where it was legal and it was trucked across the border. So there 00:09:26.450 --> 00:09:31.226 were bootlegs, um copies of Huckleberry Finn being sold in the States. And 00:09:31.259 --> 00:09:37.255 Mark Twain went to a Connecticut court and filed a lawsuit and the judge 00:09:37.288 --> 00:09:41.346 found in favor of the publisher, not him. So here's the Mark Twain letter 00:09:41.379 --> 00:09:45.515 it said approximately, I won't quote it exactly. A Connecticut judge has 00:09:45.548 --> 00:09:50.057 just found an open court that someone else can sell my property property, 00:09:50.090 --> 00:09:53.547 they have not paid for, have not acquired legally under that ruling, which 00:09:53.580 --> 00:09:58.157 I respect because it's the law I hereby offer the judge's homestead for 00:09:58.190 --> 00:10:02.116 sale. And if I make as much money out of it as I hope I'm gonna go ahead 00:10:02.149 --> 00:10:05.677 and sell the rest of his property. 00:10:05.710 --> 00:10:12.186 And instead of getting angry, he got Mark Twain, uh, he ended up finding a 00:10:12.219 --> 00:10:16.326 way to live with the mistake and to turn it into something humorous and I 00:10:16.359 --> 00:10:21.265 like that about him. That's a good story. I, I had never heard that one. 00:10:21.298 --> 00:10:26.557 Um going back now to the uh central focus of this. What was a su like when 00:10:26.590 --> 00:10:31.557 you arrived? You'd been at Virginia, at Temple at Alabama. Um So you had 00:10:31.590 --> 00:10:35.316 some, had some reference points. What, what, what did you see? What was 00:10:35.349 --> 00:10:39.366 unique about a su um It was, it's an urban school. It wasn't an urban 00:10:39.399 --> 00:10:43.395 school but didn't feel like an urban school and it didn't feel like Temple. 00:10:43.428 --> 00:10:48.936 I, it felt more like a uh uh I would say prestigious State University in 00:10:48.969 --> 00:10:52.996 an urban setting. And so we had kids who were first generation. That's one 00:10:53.029 --> 00:10:56.885 of the marks of a lot of urban schools. But we also had kids who were prep 00:10:56.918 --> 00:11:00.657 school graduates. And so it was an interesting mix of students. I got to 00:11:00.690 --> 00:11:04.996 enjoy them. I particularly enjoyed in respect of the honors college and I 00:11:05.029 --> 00:11:09.586 knew about it, uh almost firsthand because my daughter became a freshman, 00:11:09.619 --> 00:11:14.206 the year I became president here and she was in the honors college and had 00:11:14.239 --> 00:11:18.936 the kind of experience that every student should have during the years 00:11:18.969 --> 00:11:22.826 I've taught, I don't know how many students I ever inspired. I know there 00:11:22.859 --> 00:11:27.557 are examples of kids I turned off by, by using um rules that maybe didn't 00:11:27.590 --> 00:11:31.446 apply to individuals. There was something a little bit oppressive about 00:11:31.479 --> 00:11:36.927 the university when you're a kid and coming into this big organization, my 00:11:36.960 --> 00:11:42.246 daughter, some fluke ended up with four or five wonderful teachers, every 00:11:42.279 --> 00:11:45.167 single one of her teachers, her freshman year in the honors college. And 00:11:45.200 --> 00:11:48.275 she lived in the honors college when it was, I don't know if it's still 00:11:48.308 --> 00:11:54.037 residential, but uh she had a great experience and she would come home and 00:11:54.070 --> 00:11:57.726 she visited me. I lived in Mesa at the time. She would come home to do her 00:11:57.759 --> 00:12:00.856 laundry on the weekends and celebrate the faculty and she would say, oh, 00:12:00.889 --> 00:12:05.057 I'm gonna major in this. But I was wonderful. Every day she changed her 00:12:05.090 --> 00:12:09.436 major. She majored, she planned to major in every one of the classes she 00:12:09.469 --> 00:12:14.336 took, she ended up majoring in honors itself and put together her own uh 00:12:14.369 --> 00:12:20.476 degree package of um of arts and humanities in the honors program. But she 00:12:20.509 --> 00:12:25.706 had a, a good experience and, um, and made her way through school and I 00:12:25.739 --> 00:12:29.616 talked to her advisor when she graduated and she said, I always had one 00:12:29.649 --> 00:12:34.366 question, how old was Laura when she was born? Uh And I said, I don't know 00:12:34.399 --> 00:12:38.895 what that means. He said what it means is she came here um knowing what 00:12:38.928 --> 00:12:43.086 she wanted to do every single day, it changed and every single day she did 00:12:43.119 --> 00:12:48.037 it better. And it, it just uh a very great experience for her so much so 00:12:48.070 --> 00:12:54.696 that she ended up getting her uh master and doctorate at uh NYU and came 00:12:54.729 --> 00:12:59.316 back here as faculty and for a time, ran the Downtown Honors Campus. And 00:12:59.349 --> 00:13:03.936 so she's still a big a Su fan. Although I do remember the day she was 00:13:03.969 --> 00:13:09.057 taking students around in a summer tour, one of the 120 degree days. And 00:13:09.090 --> 00:13:12.986 uh she told one of the girls when, when you come back here, uh we were, 00:13:13.019 --> 00:13:17.186 the girls had stopped. I am never coming back here. Are you out of your 00:13:17.219 --> 00:13:21.846 mind? Why, why would I come back here? And Laura was trying to sell her on 00:13:21.879 --> 00:13:25.996 , on the university and the girl said, get me to an airplane. I just let 00:13:26.029 --> 00:13:31.826 it So there are two sides to the student stories here. Um But she had a 00:13:31.859 --> 00:13:35.525 wonderful time when she was here and that made me feel good. She had been 00:13:35.558 --> 00:13:39.047 accepted to the University of Wisconsin, had the winter coat, had all the 00:13:39.080 --> 00:13:43.885 stuff ready to go and visited here when I came for my interview. And she 00:13:43.918 --> 00:13:47.375 said one day, would you be mad if I went to a su instead of Wisconsin? I 00:13:47.408 --> 00:13:53.236 said, why would I be mad about that? And so she came here as almost an 00:13:53.269 --> 00:13:57.667 accident. I think her education, my education have been a series of happy 00:13:57.700 --> 00:14:03.496 accidents and things do tend to work out. Yeah. Did the size of a su um 00:14:03.529 --> 00:14:08.505 seem like an asset or a liability? Did that strike you as important in any 00:14:08.538 --> 00:14:12.456 way that came up often when I would talk to alumni groups or to potential 00:14:12.489 --> 00:14:17.946 students? And they say, where do we go? We to a small college or a large 00:14:17.979 --> 00:14:21.797 university? I said you go to a small college like all the dozen small 00:14:21.830 --> 00:14:26.956 colleges at a su because when you're in a small college in humanities and 00:14:26.989 --> 00:14:31.476 if you're here in the social sciences, you're in a particular cohort of 00:14:31.509 --> 00:14:34.746 people. Uh If you're here in the sciences, you're in a particular group of 00:14:34.779 --> 00:14:39.596 people and the honors college itself is small. And so you're in a small 00:14:39.629 --> 00:14:42.976 college in the middle of a large university with much greater opportunity 00:14:43.009 --> 00:14:46.547 , so many more things you can study that you've got the advantage of both 00:14:46.580 --> 00:14:50.596 . I don't know if I ever sold anybody on that. But, but I do believe that 00:14:50.629 --> 00:14:55.907 and I think that the, um, a humanities college and a large university is 00:14:55.940 --> 00:15:01.467 for me the ideal way to go are there, uh, are there events that stand out 00:15:01.500 --> 00:15:06.696 in your memory? Um, as, uh, ones that, uh, sort of have stayed with you? 00:15:06.729 --> 00:15:10.616 There's a story that I'd like you to tell about the Danforth Chapel, but 00:15:10.649 --> 00:15:13.407 there, there probably are others as well. It's, it's been a long time, but 00:15:13.440 --> 00:15:17.677 I do remember some of it, the Danforth Chapel had um there were people on 00:15:17.710 --> 00:15:24.476 campus who were concerned that this was a conflict between um education 00:15:24.509 --> 00:15:28.366 and religion and this is a public university and we should not be churchy 00:15:28.399 --> 00:15:33.246 and so on. Um And so, uh the conflict went on and bubbled. It was in the 00:15:33.279 --> 00:15:37.775 newspaper and not much happened until one day I got to campus early and 00:15:37.808 --> 00:15:42.976 the cross off the top of the Danforth Chapel was lying on the ground and 00:15:43.009 --> 00:15:47.576 one of the students said the wind blew it off and I said, God works in one 00:15:47.609 --> 00:15:50.746 of the ways his miracles to perform, the wind will blow it back up by 00:15:50.779 --> 00:15:55.736 tonight. Uh And the wind blew it back on top of the chapel. Come on, 00:15:55.769 --> 00:15:58.635 people. There are ways of talking about these issues instead of uh taking 00:15:58.668 --> 00:16:03.986 , taking the destruction into your own hands. But that was what I remember 00:16:04.019 --> 00:16:11.145 about that episode. Um, I also got arrested by the campus police, uh, by, 00:16:11.178 --> 00:16:15.206 uh, for driving a golf. I had a golf cart. You remember some of you will 00:16:15.239 --> 00:16:18.515 remember, uh, the president had a golf cart to get from one side of campus 00:16:18.548 --> 00:16:22.336 to another. And I didn't know that you couldn't go down the street behind 00:16:22.369 --> 00:16:26.696 the library. There was a kind of a one way street. So I got stopped. Um, 00:16:26.729 --> 00:16:32.826 and he said, uh, get off, I got off my golf cart and he said, what are you 00:16:32.859 --> 00:16:35.116 doing here? He said, well, I'm on my way to a meeting and I'm president. 00:16:35.149 --> 00:16:39.496 He said, President of what, as a president of Arizona State University, he 00:16:39.529 --> 00:16:43.956 said, no, you're not come with me. So I followed him in my cart and we 00:16:43.989 --> 00:16:48.686 went and talked to somebody who, who let me go. Um, so I, I don't know if 00:16:48.719 --> 00:16:52.206 I talk my way out of it or looked pitiful. But anyway, I was dismissed but 00:16:52.239 --> 00:16:56.557 I got arrested on campus. I thought that was fun. 00:16:56.590 --> 00:17:01.775 Anything else come to mind? Uh, the, uh, uh, more substantive. I mean, 00:17:01.808 --> 00:17:07.946 these are fun but I, I'm a, a sports fan and so I enjoyed all of the 00:17:07.979 --> 00:17:12.006 activities here and I enjoyed making a change in the activity center and 00:17:12.039 --> 00:17:15.696 changing some seats. Um, uh, row of seats. I don't know if they're still 00:17:15.729 --> 00:17:21.206 there. We changed a set of seats also though more substantive. Um I had 00:17:21.239 --> 00:17:26.085 been at individual universities never part of a system. And so when I got 00:17:26.118 --> 00:17:29.605 here, I went to the board of regents meeting and the regents meetings or 00:17:29.638 --> 00:17:33.304 the councils that I had dealt with before, were all focused 00:17:33.337 --> 00:17:38.305 representatives and, and sponsors of that institution. And I got here and 00:17:38.338 --> 00:17:41.766 there were some people on the board of regents who were not devout A SU 00:17:41.799 --> 00:17:48.666 fans. Um They uh were from the agricultural school down south. And so uh 00:17:48.699 --> 00:17:53.476 it, it was intriguing to me to watch the interplay there. And we had, well 00:17:53.509 --> 00:17:58.776 , I'll credit the press. This is not my thing. They talked about the 00:17:58.809 --> 00:18:02.325 Arizona representatives and the A SU representatives and the 00:18:02.358 --> 00:18:06.676 representatives from Port Little Nau. Uh Gene Hughes who was president 00:18:06.709 --> 00:18:09.887 would start every one of his pleas for money with a story about Port 00:18:09.920 --> 00:18:14.706 Little Nau with being overpowered by the other universities here. Um None 00:18:14.739 --> 00:18:20.776 of it was true but it was a, a kind of stick that, that he had. Um we had 00:18:20.809 --> 00:18:24.397 a disagreement once I had a disagreement once with a couple of regions 00:18:24.430 --> 00:18:30.186 about the University of Arizona establishing a campus and office uh in 00:18:30.219 --> 00:18:34.397 Tempe. Um They thought it was a good idea. I didn't think it was a good 00:18:34.430 --> 00:18:40.496 idea. I said, uh how about if we put an A SU campus in Tucson? And they 00:18:40.529 --> 00:18:43.926 said, get serious, why would you do that? And I said, um I mean, these 00:18:43.959 --> 00:18:47.785 little conversations came along and they were irritants. Uh I don't know 00:18:47.818 --> 00:18:52.226 if they changed much. Uh The regent got along. We had one regent who was 00:18:52.259 --> 00:18:55.926 the press call. Eileen, a reporter from the East Valley called the 00:18:55.959 --> 00:19:01.887 Talkative Regent. If you wanted something said she could pry it out of him 00:19:01.920 --> 00:19:05.847 and she could get about any quotation she wanted from him. It was an 00:19:05.880 --> 00:19:10.256 interesting experience because the, the breadth of experience on the board 00:19:10.289 --> 00:19:13.726 of Regents is a benefit to the university. But it also means that there 00:19:13.759 --> 00:19:17.607 are some people there who are not going to agree with one another. And so 00:19:17.640 --> 00:19:21.387 the meetings were always interesting. Um I don't know if they were always 00:19:21.420 --> 00:19:27.045 productive, but uh they had a job to do and I had a job to do so. Um I'm 00:19:27.078 --> 00:19:30.766 not sure I enjoyed it. I understood it, but it was very different from my 00:19:30.799 --> 00:19:36.436 experience before that you and I were both um able to spend a little time 00:19:36.469 --> 00:19:40.456 with one of the students who has subsequently become quite famous uh in 00:19:40.489 --> 00:19:45.426 the golf world. Uh Phil Mickelson, right? Uh Maybe you could uh people 00:19:45.459 --> 00:19:47.986 would probably like to hear a little bit about your interaction with Phil 00:19:48.019 --> 00:19:51.506 when he was here, I played with Phil twice here, I played with him uh 00:19:51.539 --> 00:19:56.647 three times subsequently because the uh NCAA golf championship was held at 00:19:56.680 --> 00:19:59.397 the University of New Mexico Campus. So when Phil came over, I played the 00:19:59.430 --> 00:20:02.996 practice round with him there. It was always a disappointment to me that 00:20:03.029 --> 00:20:07.137 when we were on the course, nobody ever confused the two of us. Uh, nobody 00:20:07.170 --> 00:20:10.656 ever came up to me and said, Phil, how are you? Um, and my wife explained 00:20:10.689 --> 00:20:14.246 that he's left handed. And so that's, that's the whole, that's the whole 00:20:14.279 --> 00:20:19.387 difference. But, uh, I asked Phil when he was a freshman and set the 00:20:19.420 --> 00:20:22.137 course record on the, on the new course. I don't know what the record is 00:20:22.170 --> 00:20:27.565 now, but he was nine under. Um And, uh, he didn't know he could miss a 00:20:27.598 --> 00:20:32.045 putt. It just, it didn't occur to him. And they all went in and I said to 00:20:32.078 --> 00:20:34.887 him, um, people were talking to him about turning pro at the end of his 00:20:34.920 --> 00:20:38.795 freshman year. I said, are you going out, are you gonna, uh, go on a tour 00:20:38.828 --> 00:20:43.226 ? And he said, no, he said I want to be able to manage my own money. He 00:20:43.259 --> 00:20:46.857 said, I know that there are people I will deal with the rest of my life 00:20:46.890 --> 00:20:50.656 are educated people. I'm gonna stay here, I'm gonna get the degree. And he 00:20:50.689 --> 00:20:54.967 also said, and I, I really admired this about it. He's a freshman said the 00:20:55.000 --> 00:20:57.956 money will still be there when I graduate. Uh There'll still be 00:20:57.989 --> 00:21:01.696 opportunities for me. I don't have to do it now. And there was, he walked 00:21:01.729 --> 00:21:05.776 out of the activity center with his diploma in the same graduating class 00:21:05.809 --> 00:21:10.726 that my daughter was in, uh, and signed a contract with the club 00:21:10.759 --> 00:21:14.266 manufacturer then for a good bit of money. And so he started off his 00:21:14.299 --> 00:21:18.666 career here, played well here, won the tournament, here, won the Phoenix, 00:21:18.699 --> 00:21:23.815 um, tournament as, as a, uh, actually he won a Tucson tournament as a 00:21:23.848 --> 00:21:28.686 college student. Um, but of course, he's won the Phoenix Open several 00:21:28.719 --> 00:21:34.967 times since, But I've, uh, I've only seen him a couple of times since then. 00:21:35.000 --> 00:21:39.795 Um, but my wife and I continue to cheer for him. He's a, he's a credit to 00:21:39.828 --> 00:21:43.147 the university 00:21:43.180 --> 00:21:47.206 when you were here. Where were the president's? Well, Provost and 00:21:47.239 --> 00:21:50.377 president's offices on campus. 00:21:50.410 --> 00:21:53.666 Um, well, you won't be able to name the building and I'm sorry, I can't. 00:21:53.699 --> 00:21:58.897 But, uh, uh, we were in the same building, uh, down the hall from each 00:21:58.930 --> 00:22:04.426 other. Uh, so my move from Provo, the president was pretty short, uh, to 00:22:04.459 --> 00:22:07.906 move down there. And in fact, a funny thing happened when, uh, when the 00:22:07.939 --> 00:22:12.446 regent asked if I would be interim president for the period it took to 00:22:12.479 --> 00:22:18.107 recruit the, the permanent president. Um, I said yes. But I had a funny 00:22:18.140 --> 00:22:23.026 problem though. I had two wonderful associate provost. I was Provost and 00:22:23.059 --> 00:22:27.706 they were Matt Betts and Elmer Gooding. And so what we did instead of you 00:22:27.739 --> 00:22:31.065 , see, I could have made one of them Provost and then we'd have to hire an 00:22:31.098 --> 00:22:34.575 associate provost and you start dominoes started moving people all over 00:22:34.608 --> 00:22:38.266 the place and that didn't seem to make sense. So what we did, the three of 00:22:38.299 --> 00:22:42.617 us sat down and we divided up the work that four of us should be doing. 00:22:42.650 --> 00:22:47.496 The president, the provost and two associate provost and we split it up by 00:22:47.529 --> 00:22:54.456 task. Uh, and so the, the three of us, I had a very busy year and didn't 00:22:54.489 --> 00:22:59.295 have to add 1/4 person to it. Uh That way when I took, temporarily, took 00:22:59.328 --> 00:23:03.416 the job and then left, they stayed on the job, they already had and 00:23:03.449 --> 00:23:08.416 already knew one of the problems that a lot of universities is that you 00:23:08.449 --> 00:23:13.545 take someone who's good at X and you promote him to Y and if you do that 00:23:13.578 --> 00:23:16.516 enough, you take the head of the English Department and make him the dean 00:23:16.549 --> 00:23:21.347 , which he's never done before. And you take somebody um in the English 00:23:21.380 --> 00:23:23.597 Department who's never had an administrative job and make him head of the 00:23:23.630 --> 00:23:27.867 department. And so what you have is two new people instantly the job. And 00:23:27.900 --> 00:23:32.597 if the, if the dominoes fall far enough, you could have a quarter of your 00:23:32.630 --> 00:23:36.226 administrators in the university, new in the job they're in, they're 00:23:36.259 --> 00:23:40.776 capable people. I recognize that, but not in that specific task. So it's 00:23:40.809 --> 00:23:46.387 an awkwardness and it's often better though less popular to hire somebody 00:23:46.420 --> 00:23:49.986 from outside who's done the job elsewhere and bring them in that creates 00:23:50.019 --> 00:23:55.226 his own problems. But, uh, um, it was kind of strange to see people change. 00:23:55.259 --> 00:23:59.726 And one of the things that I don't like about any university is the 00:23:59.759 --> 00:24:04.756 person who answers the phone the first time you call is the most recently 00:24:04.789 --> 00:24:09.607 hired, lowest paid secretary. And this is the person who's the face of the 00:24:09.640 --> 00:24:13.897 university. And you, if somebody calls and they will ask the question of 00:24:13.930 --> 00:24:17.496 someone who doesn't have any idea what the answer is, it would be much 00:24:17.529 --> 00:24:20.897 better to take the president who retires and put him on that phone. Um 00:24:20.930 --> 00:24:25.137 Somebody who does know what the place is about or a senior secretary and 00:24:25.170 --> 00:24:31.456 make it a very kind of prestigious office instead of giving it as um and 00:24:31.489 --> 00:24:35.217 make work to somebody who hasn't done the job before. No, that's not going 00:24:35.250 --> 00:24:43.117 to happen. I understand, but I make up things. It would be fun to do 00:24:43.150 --> 00:24:47.666 the uh people. I'm sure that will listen to this interview would like to 00:24:47.699 --> 00:24:52.075 know about um achievements that you feel good about during the time you 00:24:52.108 --> 00:24:56.746 were here. One obviously is the fact that the university I think operated 00:24:56.779 --> 00:25:02.325 very well in that transition um between uh when you were serving as 00:25:02.358 --> 00:25:06.196 interim president. Um I don't recall that there were any problems at all. 00:25:06.229 --> 00:25:09.607 But are there other things that uh or would you want to comment on that? 00:25:09.640 --> 00:25:13.387 But are there other things that stand out? Yeah. I would comment because 00:25:13.420 --> 00:25:19.305 uh I went to Vermont to meet with lady and he asked me what I thought the 00:25:19.338 --> 00:25:22.535 problems were and what the opportunities were. And I was as frank as I 00:25:22.568 --> 00:25:28.217 could be without any idea of what that would mean to him and then kept out 00:25:28.250 --> 00:25:33.476 of his way. And I am pleased to say I, I never gave him advice after he 00:25:33.509 --> 00:25:38.176 got here. That was not my job unless he asked a question, a specific 00:25:38.209 --> 00:25:43.486 question. And I had that benefit elsewhere when I went to um New Mexico, 00:25:43.519 --> 00:25:49.206 the preceding president and I met three times for me to ask questions, he 00:25:49.239 --> 00:25:54.617 didn't volunteer anything that uh would appear to be unnecessary advice. 00:25:54.650 --> 00:25:58.377 And I think that's a good idea because a new person has to do his job and 00:25:58.410 --> 00:26:01.795 he wouldn't be coming here if he weren't capable. And Matt and Lady 00:26:01.828 --> 00:26:05.026 already had a dozen years in the presidency elsewhere, so he knew what he 00:26:05.059 --> 00:26:09.986 was up to. But I thought the transition went well, uh except for one 00:26:10.019 --> 00:26:14.906 moment before he came, arrived, he came and we were, he and I both went to 00:26:14.939 --> 00:26:19.805 a spring baseball game and we were there and a man came up and said, Mr 00:26:19.838 --> 00:26:25.085 President and we both sat there kind of looking at each other. Who's gonna 00:26:25.118 --> 00:26:29.357 answer this one? Who's he, who's he talking to? Uh Well, uh I got over 00:26:29.390 --> 00:26:32.397 that quickly. As soon as I left, it wasn't an issue anymore and there was 00:26:32.430 --> 00:26:38.506 an issue with lady. But uh he had a good run here and uh I, I enjoyed 00:26:38.539 --> 00:26:42.055 talking with him a couple of times after I went to New Mexico. So I would 00:26:42.088 --> 00:26:46.956 give him a call and he was always open to talk. He told a wonderful story. 00:26:46.989 --> 00:26:51.016 This is his story. But let me tell it. He said when you become president 00:26:51.049 --> 00:26:56.315 of the university, um it's very easy for your ego to swell. You get to be 00:26:56.348 --> 00:27:00.045 very self important. Very quickly. He said, he, when he became president 00:27:00.078 --> 00:27:02.607 of Vermont, he'd only been there a week and his son came running upstairs 00:27:02.640 --> 00:27:06.357 , he was taking a shower. His son, you got a, you got a phone call and 00:27:06.390 --> 00:27:09.305 Larry said, take, take the message. He said, no, no, no, it's Time 00:27:09.338 --> 00:27:13.696 magazine and they, they have to talk to you. So he got dried off and went 00:27:13.729 --> 00:27:18.416 to the phone and said, this is President Core. Um And he said, wondering 00:27:18.449 --> 00:27:22.026 all the time, which of my faculty has done something worth celebrating or 00:27:22.059 --> 00:27:26.637 something worth criminal indictment. And the woman on the phone said, oh, 00:27:26.670 --> 00:27:31.506 I'm glad I've got you. We've got a special offer now and a few years of 00:27:31.539 --> 00:27:34.607 all. 00:27:34.640 --> 00:27:38.545 And he said, uh now I, I might not have taken the call if I'd known what 00:27:38.578 --> 00:27:42.486 it was about. But, but my ego told me it's Time Magazine and they want to 00:27:42.519 --> 00:27:47.256 talk to somebody important. So here I am. Um I, I like the self effacing 00:27:47.289 --> 00:27:49.776 part of that story. 00:27:49.809 --> 00:27:52.906 Are there any challenges as you think over your career? Are there any 00:27:52.939 --> 00:27:58.065 challenges that uh were especially uh interesting or tough to overcome or 00:27:58.098 --> 00:28:04.276 that remain in your memory? Um Well, 00:28:04.309 --> 00:28:09.805 I, I know that um it is, as lady said, it, it's easy to uh think you are 00:28:09.838 --> 00:28:13.516 worth more than you are the, the, the job. First of all, it is the job 00:28:13.549 --> 00:28:17.656 that's important and not the guy who's doing the job. And it's, uh, hard 00:28:17.689 --> 00:28:24.426 to remember that sometimes. Um, when I went to a meeting, I had a long 00:28:24.459 --> 00:28:29.496 stretch here where I didn't have any days off and I went to a meeting and 00:28:29.529 --> 00:28:33.805 my wife and I were off campus and I got there and I had a phone message 00:28:33.838 --> 00:28:38.045 from my secretary and I thought, oh, what is it? The, one of the regents 00:28:38.078 --> 00:28:43.585 had a couple of sons who had done badly in math here and he'd been calling 00:28:43.618 --> 00:28:47.825 me regularly and I thought, oh, here's more of that. So I went to the pick 00:28:47.858 --> 00:28:52.706 up the phone and the lady from my office who called said, uh, you're gonna 00:28:52.739 --> 00:28:56.347 be gone four days here. You want me to water your plants while you're gone 00:28:56.380 --> 00:29:02.867 ? Um, I made an executive decision and I said, yes, go ahead and water the 00:29:02.900 --> 00:29:08.617 plants. Um, your life goes on. The plants need watering. It's not all 00:29:08.650 --> 00:29:11.585 about what the regions are concerned with. It's about who's gonna water 00:29:11.618 --> 00:29:15.266 your plants. 00:29:15.299 --> 00:29:22.256 What's your, uh, do you have a best memory uh of your time here? Uh I, I'm 00:29:22.289 --> 00:29:25.607 embarrassed to admit this. I don't remember the name of the campus student 00:29:25.640 --> 00:29:31.305 newspaper. The State Press. State Press. OK. The State Press, um, had 00:29:31.338 --> 00:29:36.986 three students interview me and, uh, it was much more laudatory and 00:29:37.019 --> 00:29:42.127 complimentary than I deserved. And they wrote a story about, uh they were 00:29:42.160 --> 00:29:47.545 sorry, I was uh leaving and going to another university and uh it was very 00:29:47.578 --> 00:29:51.055 flattering and I saved it and I probably believed it. I don't think 00:29:51.088 --> 00:29:57.075 anybody else would, but it was, uh it was full of uh compliments for, for 00:29:57.108 --> 00:30:03.946 little tiny things. Uh listening to people uh um being present, I went to 00:30:03.979 --> 00:30:07.686 every campus activity that I could think of. I went to club meetings. And 00:30:07.719 --> 00:30:13.315 , uh, and so it's what somebody told me. It was facetime. You got to be at 00:30:13.348 --> 00:30:16.986 the meetings, you have to show up, you have to be there and demonstrate 00:30:17.019 --> 00:30:22.585 that you're interested. Um I wore the colors, I still believe in that. I 00:30:22.618 --> 00:30:27.706 was asked to advise an incoming president at another university and he was 00:30:27.739 --> 00:30:34.166 going to an alumni meeting and I said that school's colors were uh a 00:30:34.199 --> 00:30:39.166 couple of shades of green and blue and he had a red necktie on. I said, no 00:30:39.199 --> 00:30:42.976 , I can't change your necktie. And he said that's not important. I said 00:30:43.009 --> 00:30:47.436 what are the alumni? It probably, it's a dumb little thing. I know. And he 00:30:47.469 --> 00:30:50.555 said, well, I'm pretty busy so I went to the student bookstore and bought 00:30:50.588 --> 00:30:55.107 him a necktie. Um, and it, it matters. 00:30:55.140 --> 00:31:00.026 Um, you dress up not to look impressive, you dress up to show respect for 00:31:00.059 --> 00:31:04.357 the people you're talking to and I, I wanna know that you care about the 00:31:04.390 --> 00:31:08.446 institution. It's a tiny little thing but I don't know, it's probably my 00:31:08.479 --> 00:31:14.496 wife taught me that. Um I don't know who else. I know that. Uh both Gary 00:31:14.529 --> 00:31:19.176 sitting beside me and Sam Kirkpatrick knew that I was a candidate here and 00:31:19.209 --> 00:31:26.075 we had two or three conversations about that. Um Sam told me um things I 00:31:26.108 --> 00:31:31.597 would dislike about the place. Um Gary was a good adviser, telling me to 00:31:31.630 --> 00:31:34.967 be patient and wait. It took a long time for me to hear it was a long time 00:31:35.000 --> 00:31:42.506 before the response to my letter. Um So it was uh little comforting uh 00:31:42.539 --> 00:31:46.867 support like that. Very helpful to somebody in a, in a public and visible 00:31:46.900 --> 00:31:49.186 job. 00:31:49.219 --> 00:31:53.276 Oh, I know this happened after you left a su but it provides insight into 00:31:53.309 --> 00:31:59.387 uh the way you approach leadership and the presidency. I recall once that 00:31:59.420 --> 00:32:03.305 uh it seems like you hurt your back at New Mexico uh helping new students 00:32:03.338 --> 00:32:06.406 when they arrived on campus. That might be an interesting, it was, it was 00:32:06.439 --> 00:32:11.406 fun to do um Each semester when the students would come in, I would put on 00:32:11.439 --> 00:32:15.545 khakis and a sweatshirt and go help them move into the dorm and grab a 00:32:15.578 --> 00:32:19.795 suitcase and take it up there. And I never identified myself. I just 00:32:19.828 --> 00:32:22.397 wanted to know where they were from, what they were here, what they were 00:32:22.430 --> 00:32:25.746 looking for. And I could point them to people who could give them the 00:32:25.779 --> 00:32:31.476 answers. And that was a way for me to get to know them. And one of them I 00:32:31.509 --> 00:32:34.467 will tell the story is not about here. But if you don't mind the story 00:32:34.500 --> 00:32:37.967 about New Mexico, uh a woman named Abby Garchik was from Racine Wisconsin 00:32:38.000 --> 00:32:42.456 , which is where I was uh went to high school and I happened to be in 00:32:42.489 --> 00:32:45.266 Racine visiting my mother when I saw that she had signed to play 00:32:45.299 --> 00:32:48.555 basketball at New Mexico. So I called, there's only one Garchik on the 00:32:48.588 --> 00:32:53.266 phone I called and I said this is Richard Peck. I'm president of um a 00:32:53.299 --> 00:32:58.637 University of New Mexico. She said, no, you're not. And hung up. So I 00:32:58.670 --> 00:33:02.406 called again. I said, yes I am and she's not. Some, some friends were 00:33:02.439 --> 00:33:06.166 making fun of me. And I said, no, I'm really well, we finally talked it 00:33:06.199 --> 00:33:10.585 out but she came to campus, she and her grandfather and I helped her take 00:33:10.618 --> 00:33:13.967 her bags into her room and she would not talk to me or not. Look at me the 00:33:14.000 --> 00:33:18.186 whole time and she stuck her head and hide every time for four years, she 00:33:18.219 --> 00:33:22.815 hid every time I went by, I'm embarrassed by that. But, uh, yeah, kids are 00:33:22.848 --> 00:33:27.666 kids and it's, it's fun to see how they're behaving. Um, I don't mind the 00:33:27.699 --> 00:33:30.305 tattoos and the haircuts and all the rest of it different from my 00:33:30.338 --> 00:33:36.127 generation. But, uh, uh, the kids I met here and there have all been 00:33:36.160 --> 00:33:41.065 pretty nice, excited about what they're doing and that's fun 00:33:41.098 --> 00:33:46.416 looking, uh, at your time now in retirement. Uh, how do you, you, you 00:33:46.449 --> 00:33:49.055 talked a little bit about it but maybe you could elaborate a little bit on 00:33:49.088 --> 00:33:52.416 how you spend your time and, and what motivates you and, uh, keeps you 00:33:52.449 --> 00:33:57.446 active. Um, in the, uh, Albuquerque area, there are 19 senior residences 00:33:57.479 --> 00:34:02.416 and retirement centers and I go from one to another. I, I've been to each 00:34:02.449 --> 00:34:06.887 one of them at least twice, most of them, three or four times and, and 00:34:06.920 --> 00:34:10.845 tell stories and talk about things like, uh, travel stories or whatever. 00:34:10.878 --> 00:34:14.276 Uh, as part of the entertaining. If they enjoy it, sometimes they buy one 00:34:14.309 --> 00:34:18.416 of my books. I have, uh, if you, if you allow me to count published plays 00:34:18.449 --> 00:34:21.365 as books, they're in book form, but they're different. They're not as 00:34:21.398 --> 00:34:25.526 popular and people don't read plays very much, but I've got 27 titles now. 00:34:25.559 --> 00:34:29.635 And so I go and talk about them in one way or another. Some people buy 00:34:29.668 --> 00:34:36.236 the books, some don't. Um, but it's a way for me to keep active, I guess. 00:34:36.269 --> 00:34:40.615 And I continue to write my wife and I see too many films we see every 00:34:40.648 --> 00:34:45.615 movie that comes out I think, including the bad ones. Um, I play golf 00:34:45.648 --> 00:34:50.155 badly as Gary knows. But, um, I've been at it for a while. I can still 00:34:50.188 --> 00:34:54.017 shoot in the high eighties, not the low eighties anymore. And I never got 00:34:54.050 --> 00:34:57.896 any better than that, but I enjoy it. And people who don't play golf, say 00:34:57.929 --> 00:35:02.057 , why do you spend all that time? I get to walk five miles on the lawn 00:35:02.090 --> 00:35:06.276 that somebody else mowed. I mean, it's a, it's a pretty place and courses 00:35:06.309 --> 00:35:11.146 are, um, at the Carson course is wonderful. It starts off so easy. The 1st 00:35:11.179 --> 00:35:15.767 23 holes and it gets tougher and tougher and pretty soon you get put in 00:35:15.800 --> 00:35:19.135 your place. But, um, I've enjoyed playing there. I've played with Gary, a 00:35:19.168 --> 00:35:22.497 number of others here. When my wife and I come back to visit our daughter 00:35:22.530 --> 00:35:28.017 , we go over and play the chorus. So I play golf more than I should. I, uh 00:35:28.050 --> 00:35:34.767 , read, watch movies and I write and I write almost all day every day. So 00:35:34.800 --> 00:35:40.066 I just, just finished the, a novel about five years of peacetime Marine 00:35:40.099 --> 00:35:45.236 Corps when I was in, from 54 to 59. The only time in American history when 00:35:45.269 --> 00:35:48.885 the Marine Corps was not being shot at somewhere we had no active enemies 00:35:48.918 --> 00:35:53.626 at the time and I've taken credit for that. Um, during my five years in 00:35:53.659 --> 00:35:57.885 the Marine Corps, nobody messed with us. Um, and I would go back but they 00:35:57.918 --> 00:36:03.796 wouldn't take me now. Um, so, uh, I like telling stories and I write them 00:36:03.829 --> 00:36:08.727 down and tell stories to my grandkids and to anybody who will listen, your 00:36:08.760 --> 00:36:11.706 website says you get up in the morning and you walk so many steps to your 00:36:11.739 --> 00:36:15.635 typewriter. 16 steps, 16 steps. Somebody asked me that one day. Well, what 00:36:15.668 --> 00:36:19.936 do you do? I walk over to the, and I sit there all day and I can see out 00:36:19.969 --> 00:36:24.557 the window and I got, uh, my stereo behind me and a TV, over in the corner 00:36:24.590 --> 00:36:28.276 if I want to do that. And, um, every once in a while my wife feeds me and 00:36:28.309 --> 00:36:32.736 she knows where I am. So I'm there and I literally, we go to that early 00:36:32.769 --> 00:36:39.057 movie, the like seniors. Um, we are and, uh, we take care of ourselves. My 00:36:39.090 --> 00:36:45.936 wife is an avid gardener. She's got about 800 a registered named Daylily. 00:36:45.969 --> 00:36:49.537 She's on the national board of a Daily Association. So that takes a lot 00:36:49.570 --> 00:36:55.456 of her time. So, uh, we live in the same house and we pass occasionally. 00:36:55.489 --> 00:37:02.017 So, are there any other, uh, things you'd like to, uh, talk about or tell 00:37:02.050 --> 00:37:05.916 us about, uh, as we, as we wrap this up, things we haven't covered or uh 00:37:05.949 --> 00:37:11.195 that people might be interested in. Um I learned a lot while I was here. 00:37:11.228 --> 00:37:16.486 One of the things that I admire was the library and uh one of my ambitions 00:37:16.519 --> 00:37:20.626 when I got to New Mexico was to make the library and I'll be frank about 00:37:20.659 --> 00:37:26.316 this as good and as nationally recognized as a S US library and that took 00:37:26.349 --> 00:37:31.077 some effort. Um But I came back to visit here and talk to the librarian 00:37:31.110 --> 00:37:35.666 who may have been maybe gone by now. I don't know. Sherry Schmidt was uh 00:37:35.699 --> 00:37:39.626 no, no, it was. I know who you mean. Then it was her, the fellow that 00:37:39.659 --> 00:37:43.385 preceded her. And he said he was very proud. He said, we now have 00:37:43.418 --> 00:37:48.276 accessioned every book in the library, any book. Uh We have them all in 00:37:48.309 --> 00:37:52.717 the card catalog. And I said, well, maybe not. Um because I looked up mine 00:37:52.750 --> 00:37:56.276 which people do and it's not in the card catalog. He said, well, no, no, 00:37:56.309 --> 00:37:59.956 no. Ok. I'll say this any book that's been checked out in the last 10 00:37:59.989 --> 00:38:02.227 years 00:38:02.260 --> 00:38:06.787 when it comes back in. We're certain to put it in the card catalog. And I 00:38:06.820 --> 00:38:10.986 said, do you know what you just said? I, he said, oh, no, no, no. What I 00:38:11.019 --> 00:38:14.796 said was people like your book so much, they read it in the sack, they 00:38:14.829 --> 00:38:20.675 don't even check it out. But um I'm a li a fan of libraries and when I go 00:38:20.708 --> 00:38:25.416 to different schools. I go to the library and, and see people I know um, 00:38:25.449 --> 00:38:28.956 some of the former English faculty here, I've uh read Mark Harris, for 00:38:28.989 --> 00:38:33.997 instance, I, before I ever got here I was at uh Virginia, there was a, a 00:38:34.030 --> 00:38:38.756 television, a radio program called Quiz the Professor. And I was asked one 00:38:38.789 --> 00:38:42.537 day to go on the show and talk about a book you like. And so I said, I did 00:38:42.570 --> 00:38:48.086 , I, I like a book by uh Mark Harris. It's called Wake Up Stupid. Uh And 00:38:48.119 --> 00:38:51.706 it's about the teacher and then there's the, the South Paw and that's by 00:38:51.739 --> 00:38:58.827 Mark Harris. And so I um got a copy of my interview and sent it to Mark 00:38:58.860 --> 00:39:04.546 Harris. I, I didn't know him. It maybe the only fan letter I sent and I 00:39:04.579 --> 00:39:07.827 got to meet him when I finally came here and he was on the faculty. I had 00:39:07.860 --> 00:39:12.776 not known him before that. And you know, you, you picture people and I 00:39:12.809 --> 00:39:20.809 pictured this big husky ruddy guy and he wasn't, he was uh uh average size 00:39:21.228 --> 00:39:27.506 uh getting along in years, quiet man. Um But I knew him from his books and 00:39:27.539 --> 00:39:31.635 that's before I ever got here. Well, there are people out there who know 00:39:31.668 --> 00:39:34.876 Arizona State because of the faculty who are here because of the things 00:39:34.909 --> 00:39:39.206 that have happened because of activities in the space program, things that 00:39:39.239 --> 00:39:44.646 are going on that not all of us pay attention to but individuals out there 00:39:44.679 --> 00:39:48.925 know something about lots of people here and, uh, and I admire that about 00:39:48.958 --> 00:39:52.717 a university. It's true of my own university. It's true of, I went to 00:39:52.750 --> 00:39:57.787 South Florida after retirement. I spent a year as interim president down 00:39:57.820 --> 00:40:03.885 there while they look for a capable person. And, um, and I had a good time. 00:40:03.918 --> 00:40:08.666 I enjoyed it because I, I like universities. I like the, the people who 00:40:08.699 --> 00:40:13.865 are there. I was once writing a story. Um And at the university there is, 00:40:13.898 --> 00:40:17.796 there's an expert on everything, everything you want to know. And so I had 00:40:17.829 --> 00:40:23.336 to find a drug for a, a TV script. I was trying to write. I said, I want a 00:40:23.369 --> 00:40:27.557 drug that will give you a chemical lobotomy. That is, if I take this drug 00:40:27.590 --> 00:40:32.425 , I'll be so perfectly compliant, complacent. I'll do anything I'm told. 00:40:32.458 --> 00:40:36.807 But you can't tell that I've been drugged and I asked a pharmacologist at 00:40:36.840 --> 00:40:38.695 the university where I was and he said, oh, you mean one of the veridical 00:40:38.728 --> 00:40:43.816 ? I said spill veridical. I mean, that's, I don't know what that means. I 00:40:43.849 --> 00:40:46.057 didn't know that he gave me the name of a drug. I have no idea what it was 00:40:46.090 --> 00:40:52.086 , but I look very authoritative in my book. Uh It's uh it's in there. Um 00:40:52.119 --> 00:40:56.436 And it's just at the university, if you have a question on architecture on 00:40:56.469 --> 00:41:00.557 any, you can walk across the campus and talk to somebody and they know. 00:41:00.590 --> 00:41:06.666 And uh that's great fun. It's the education continues. Um If you stay 00:41:06.699 --> 00:41:11.436 curious, you learn a lot of things, the uh architecture school with the 00:41:11.469 --> 00:41:19.469 lavender stone. Um I remember hearing from uh architect that he went up on 00:41:20.010 --> 00:41:23.296 a mountain and broke them on a stone and that's the color that became the 00:41:23.329 --> 00:41:27.327 architecture school. And that was his version. I said, go find me that 00:41:27.360 --> 00:41:31.356 stone. I don't believe you. Uh I don't think that's true, but I also had a 00:41:31.389 --> 00:41:36.115 faculty member in the history department. I promised my last story stopped 00:41:36.148 --> 00:41:41.166 in my office. She said, she said, have you seen the new building? I said, 00:41:41.199 --> 00:41:46.287 yes, she said, do you see it's a lavender colored. I said, yes. She said, 00:41:46.320 --> 00:41:50.997 well, that's got to be painted or taken down. And I said, II, I, I'm sorry 00:41:51.030 --> 00:41:55.146 , who, who do you represent? She, she said, what do you mean? I said, will 00:41:55.179 --> 00:41:59.626 you read me this message and she know my, me my opinion. I, I hate that 00:41:59.659 --> 00:42:03.856 building. You either have to paint it or, or, or do something cover it up 00:42:03.889 --> 00:42:10.856 . I said, or what, you know, what will you do if we don't? Well, I'm just 00:42:10.889 --> 00:42:17.436 , I, you must um that's another side of the faculty. 00:42:17.469 --> 00:42:24.586 Um They have firm ideas based on God knows what. Uh And they are the 00:42:24.619 --> 00:42:29.405 people who become president, by the way, I admired one president who 00:42:29.438 --> 00:42:32.876 allowed himself one A CD every semester I said, I don't know what that 00:42:32.909 --> 00:42:39.057 means. He's one a CD. He said that's an arbitrary and capricious decision 00:42:39.090 --> 00:42:42.936 is based on nothing at all. And I'm not going to explain it. So he had to 00:42:42.969 --> 00:42:47.405 a semester. That's a good principle. Some people think uh presidents 00:42:47.438 --> 00:42:52.537 become isolated from what's really going on. Um And I recall you gave a 00:42:52.570 --> 00:42:58.945 talk one time where they were going to introduce the, introduce the 00:42:58.978 --> 00:43:03.497 speakers alphabetically. Uh Maybe you could recall that story for no, this 00:43:03.530 --> 00:43:08.666 was a con um Deans of Arts and Science. I think it was a deans meeting. Um 00:43:08.699 --> 00:43:12.307 And we were talking about the importance of a provost, which I think is 00:43:12.340 --> 00:43:15.845 very important. And I said, when I was president, I did whatever the 00:43:15.878 --> 00:43:19.405 provost advised me. I mean, here's somebody who knows what's going on. And 00:43:19.438 --> 00:43:25.727 so the man who was the uh introducing us all said we have three speakers 00:43:25.760 --> 00:43:29.066 and we're going to introduce them alphabetically. Let's start with 00:43:29.099 --> 00:43:34.365 President Peck. And um we had a couple other people higher in the alphabet. 00:43:34.398 --> 00:43:38.175 And I said to him, now, I'm not gonna argue with you because I never 00:43:38.208 --> 00:43:42.776 argued with my own provost. But if they've changed the alphabet, nobody 00:43:42.809 --> 00:43:47.905 has told me about that. And that's really the provost's obligation to keep 00:43:47.938 --> 00:43:51.776 you informed, to keep you up to date. Um So I went out of order then, but 00:43:51.809 --> 00:43:55.865 uh so uh I see you have to be careful what you say, because he was there 00:43:55.898 --> 00:43:59.126 and he remembers that uh 00:43:59.159 --> 00:44:06.217 it was all. Um and uh never mind. Um Well, Dick, we've enjoyed uh your 00:44:06.250 --> 00:44:09.787 insights and your stories. Uh We appreciate the effort you made to get 00:44:09.820 --> 00:44:13.195 back here and uh participate in this program. Well, my pleasure. I, in 00:44:13.228 --> 00:44:18.727 fact, I've spoken longer than I was president 00:44:18.760 --> 00:44:22.905 and I hope somebody has fun with it. 00:44:22.938 --> 00:44:26.885 Thank you. The purple building I think was designed by an architect, New 00:44:26.918 --> 00:44:31.945 Mexico architect named Frido. Yes, it was. He knew the architecture 00:44:31.978 --> 00:44:38.146 building and when you were there. Yes, for Rogers. Yeah, he did. And he uh 00:44:38.179 --> 00:44:42.816 he was the one who explained the lavender color of it. But um I see, I, I 00:44:42.849 --> 00:44:46.905 know I've met him since then and he's got the um Red Cross building in, in 00:44:46.938 --> 00:44:51.856 Albuquerque that's blood red. Um He's also got a very interesting low 00:44:51.889 --> 00:44:56.586 income housing with um it's just a, it's a block, there's nothing to it 00:44:56.619 --> 00:44:59.155 except that around the rim of the building and doors, there are 00:44:59.188 --> 00:45:04.526 fluorescent tubes um and it just, it picks it up, it just uh he has very 00:45:04.559 --> 00:45:10.467 clever ideas. Um But he's also a snake oil salesman and uh what he says 00:45:10.500 --> 00:45:14.896 has very little to do with what he does. I think the, the, the um you're 00:45:14.929 --> 00:45:19.296 not taping this anyway when he got the commission to do Disneyland in 00:45:19.329 --> 00:45:25.267 Paris and everybody else took models in and he took in a shoe box full of 00:45:25.300 --> 00:45:27.307 gravel, 00:45:27.340 --> 00:45:31.878 dumped it on the table and said, I'm bringing you the American Southwest. 00:45:32.090 --> 00:45:34.090 Got the co he got the commission. Um, well, he's just, uh, he can sell ice 00:45:38.909 --> 00:45:42.307 cubes, Eskimos, you know, that kind of story. A very clever guy and a good 00:45:42.340 --> 00:45:46.655 architect. Um, but yeah, he was the one who did the building when they 00:45:46.688 --> 00:45:50.506 were designing the building. I don't know if it was ever built. No, it, I 00:45:50.539 --> 00:45:56.506 don't think it was built. Um a different one was, but across the street 00:45:56.539 --> 00:46:00.296 from the library at one time, they were designing a building for that 00:46:00.329 --> 00:46:05.635 space. And uh I think it was Will Bruder or the one that he did the 00:46:05.668 --> 00:46:12.006 Phoenix Library maybe. Anyway, he submitted plans and um it had, it wasn't 00:46:12.039 --> 00:46:15.537 going to cost too much and had too many too. Uh The square footage was too 00:46:15.570 --> 00:46:21.236 great. And so they asked him to redo it and 00:46:21.269 --> 00:46:24.736 it looked to us like all he'd done is put it in the copy machine and, and 00:46:24.769 --> 00:46:27.706 recopy it at 90%. 00:46:27.739 --> 00:46:33.256 So all the rooms that were 10 by 10 were now nine by nine or something. 00:46:33.289 --> 00:46:37.077 Anyway, we never built the building. The humanities building at Temple 00:46:37.110 --> 00:46:41.155 University was designed at 13 stories. Uh The dean was sitting in his 00:46:41.188 --> 00:46:44.026 office, the building went up and they put the flag on, on the Christmas 00:46:44.059 --> 00:46:46.986 tree to top off the building. He sat through County and there were only 12 00:46:47.019 --> 00:46:51.135 stories. And so he went over to the site and said, what's the problem here 00:46:51.168 --> 00:46:55.747 ? This is nothing, nothing. We, we, we were over budget. So we cut a floor. 00:46:55.780 --> 00:47:01.247 There was a meeting of whose floor had been cut. Um, who was this foreign 00:47:01.280 --> 00:47:05.506 languages? And they said, no, no. Um, we, uh, we had the 13th floor. 00:47:05.539 --> 00:47:08.787 There's no 13th floor up there. I'm sorry, you're, you're out. No, it's 00:47:08.820 --> 00:47:11.635 gotta be somebody else. It's one of the middle floors is gone. You see a 00:47:11.668 --> 00:47:15.776 gap in that building. Uh This conversation went on for, for about two 00:47:15.809 --> 00:47:19.727 hours and it had to happen because the state didn't have the money. And so 00:47:19.760 --> 00:47:24.537 they reduced it by one floor. Um And the English Department ended up with 00:47:24.570 --> 00:47:29.336 the 13th floor. It was very nice. We had great views all of Philadelphia, 00:47:29.369 --> 00:47:32.247 but uh we were supposed to be elsewhere in the building. I don't know how 00:47:32.280 --> 00:47:35.905 that happened. We're talking about buildings when Sam Sam came as dean and 00:47:35.938 --> 00:47:40.526 I became associate dean. One of the projects that was under way was in 00:47:40.559 --> 00:47:46.135 addition to the physical science complex and they really, some of the 00:47:46.168 --> 00:47:51.287 people that were involved in that really wanted a planetarium in it. And 00:47:51.320 --> 00:47:57.095 um uh the Adler Planetarium in Chicago had apparently decided to move to 00:47:57.128 --> 00:48:01.767 higher technology and they were going to give us or maybe sell us for a 00:48:01.800 --> 00:48:08.336 very modest price. The projector that projected the images on the domed 00:48:08.369 --> 00:48:11.666 ceiling of the planetarium. 00:48:11.699 --> 00:48:16.236 Um And yet when we looked at the plans that called for an arc of a certain 00:48:16.269 --> 00:48:19.977 size, it would have occupied not one floor but several floors or perhaps 00:48:20.010 --> 00:48:26.175 even 2, 2.5 floors. And yet the architect's plans showed the planetarium 00:48:26.208 --> 00:48:30.577 as being a single floor. And so we could all envision this planetarium 00:48:30.610 --> 00:48:35.405 that went like this and then across everything would be out of place. But 00:48:35.438 --> 00:48:39.865 nobody seemed to have thought of that. Uh Just crazy stuff that uh a 00:48:39.898 --> 00:48:47.898 person runs into. Are there any questions from anybody here? I thought you 00:48:48.148 --> 00:48:53.977 said you were president that 19 month period and not enter a president? Oh 00:48:54.010 --> 00:48:59.727 , I thought I was but Eileen didn't. Um because 00:48:59.760 --> 00:49:04.986 uh I don't remember the numbers Russ I think was 11th president and she 00:49:05.019 --> 00:49:08.506 described Lati cos 12th and I said, what about me? She said interims don't 00:49:08.539 --> 00:49:13.077 count. So for a time I call myself 11.5. That's what I was telling you in 00:49:13.110 --> 00:49:17.095 the uh in the building. There are these portraits of presidents. You don't 00:49:17.128 --> 00:49:20.477 see me over there. Um What happened was they took a Polaroid picture of me 00:49:20.510 --> 00:49:24.646 did not use the crayon on it. And so it all faded away. It's gone, but I 00:49:24.679 --> 00:49:30.477 was the only president eight months or whatever. Um Yeah, it's just 00:49:30.510 --> 00:49:34.615 interims don't come. So that's the title of the story that I thought I was 00:49:34.648 --> 00:49:40.787 the interim at Arizona at the South Florida for one year when uh president 00:49:40.820 --> 00:49:45.566 retired and then um 00:49:45.599 --> 00:49:49.956 got offered the presidency at the University of Florida. But I had told 00:49:49.989 --> 00:49:56.077 too many Gainesville jokes and I just didn't want to risk it. I, I got the 00:49:56.110 --> 00:50:00.057 , I got the first press conference, something I never learned to keep my 00:50:00.090 --> 00:50:03.195 mouth shut. I, I used to have a wall plaque. I don't have any more. Said I 00:50:03.228 --> 00:50:07.077 was never hurt by the things I didn't say. Now, I should remember that 00:50:07.110 --> 00:50:11.537 because this reporter said now that you're here, are you gonna become a 00:50:11.570 --> 00:50:16.595 Tampa Bay football fan? And I said, I've been a Green Bay Packer fan all 00:50:16.628 --> 00:50:20.396 my life and I don't think I could develop an interest in minor league 00:50:20.429 --> 00:50:25.376 football. Um Well, come on people. That's a joke. That's just uh uh 00:50:25.409 --> 00:50:31.206 headline in the paper, new, new president called Tampa Bay Minor League 00:50:31.239 --> 00:50:36.376 team. Uh The only benefit that came out of that. There was a Battle of the 00:50:36.409 --> 00:50:42.546 Bays. You when Tampa Bay hosted Green Bay and one of the guys gave me two 00:50:42.579 --> 00:50:46.217 tickets to go see the Battle of the Bays. Tampa Bay won. I have to say 00:50:46.250 --> 00:50:51.997 that was unexpected. Where old did they send you? I was a board carrier. 00:50:52.030 --> 00:50:56.896 Oh, you were a lot, a lot. So I got to go to Hawaii first time. I spent my 00:50:56.929 --> 00:51:02.436 21st birthday on Oahu. Didn't tell anybody it was my birthday. Um Got to 00:51:02.469 --> 00:51:06.537 Japan, Okinawa, the Philippines. So spent a lot of time with our carrier. 00:51:06.570 --> 00:51:14.026 Um And I just, as I said, I just finished a book about that period of time. 00:51:14.059 --> 00:51:20.316 I went in planning to make it a career and got discouraged. Um And I have 00:51:20.349 --> 00:51:24.876 an equation that you may not like, but I think the Marine Corps, maybe the 00:51:24.909 --> 00:51:29.345 Army Navy, I know the Marine Corps is like the Catholic church. Um the 00:51:29.378 --> 00:51:33.727 institution itself is right. 00:51:33.760 --> 00:51:39.126 But its servants are not. And it's not the church that got all the sexual 00:51:39.159 --> 00:51:44.557 misbehavior. It was a few priests and the Marine Corps has got any big 00:51:44.590 --> 00:51:49.586 organization. It's got a lot of time servers and people who, um, lost 00:51:49.619 --> 00:51:53.247 their energy years ago and forgot why they are there and they're not doing 00:51:53.280 --> 00:51:57.807 the job that they said they would do. Um And so I got discouraged at that. 00:51:57.840 --> 00:52:02.956 Uh I watched, um, a major with 18 years get kicked out because the Marine 00:52:02.989 --> 00:52:06.336 Corps was saving money and they got anybody who didn't have a permanent 00:52:06.369 --> 00:52:11.195 rank, they let him go. So here he is eight. a 40 year old unemployed 00:52:11.228 --> 00:52:15.896 helicopter pilot. Where is he gonna go? Um So there was no career there 00:52:15.929 --> 00:52:19.986 for me and everybody, there are two of us in the 60 man squadron who had 00:52:20.019 --> 00:52:25.747 not been to college. And so I, uh I knew I was missing something, whatever 00:52:25.780 --> 00:52:28.967 that was. So I just wanted to do what they had, that's a pretty amazing 00:52:29.000 --> 00:52:34.416 statistic two out of 60. That hadn't they? Many, we had uh, seven or eight 00:52:34.449 --> 00:52:40.146 academy graduates. Um Marine Corps still has Mustangs now. And then, uh, 00:52:40.179 --> 00:52:45.037 enlisted, I was 19. I got commissioned at 19, got my, went to my first 00:52:45.070 --> 00:52:48.017 duty station in California and the colonel called me and said, Lieutenant 00:52:48.050 --> 00:52:51.175 , you got a problem in your record. Your record is wrong here says you're 00:52:51.208 --> 00:52:55.017 19. And I said, well, I am. He said, no, you can't be an officer until 00:52:55.050 --> 00:52:59.646 you're 21. I said, apparently you can, um, cause I am, he said, God's sake. 00:52:59.679 --> 00:53:03.727 Boy, don't you tell anybody that 00:53:03.760 --> 00:53:08.727 that's, he gave me a nice collateral duty. And the NCO mess we had 00:53:08.760 --> 00:53:13.756 underage guys drinking. He said, clear that up. I said, I said, Colonel, 00:53:13.789 --> 00:53:20.577 I'm 19. He said they don't know that. Um, what's the name of the book at 00:53:20.610 --> 00:53:25.316 the moment? If uh poetry doesn't change, it's called spit. 00:53:25.349 --> 00:53:30.626 Um It's big. I mean, it's 100 and 20,000 words. It's just way too big. I 00:53:30.659 --> 00:53:36.986 may have to cut it down some, but uh it's about a three month period when 00:53:37.019 --> 00:53:42.557 uh there is a foreign maneuver when the Marine Corps goes to the 00:53:42.590 --> 00:53:47.836 Philippines for a maneuver. And so it's, I, I think I learned something in 00:53:47.869 --> 00:53:50.586 the middle of it that, that a lot of marines won't like I've given it to 00:53:50.619 --> 00:53:55.486 four marines to instead of having um some famous author, write me a blurb 00:53:55.519 --> 00:54:00.126 on the jacket. I gave it to four marines and said, give me a couple of 00:54:00.159 --> 00:54:03.276 sentences. What do you think of the book? And one of them has answered me. 00:54:03.309 --> 00:54:06.816 Uh The others are not gonna like it, I think because they are both 00:54:06.849 --> 00:54:11.416 officers and one of the points in the book was um the, the real Corp, the 00:54:11.449 --> 00:54:16.546 real Marine Corps is still there among enlisted men. I don't think it's 00:54:16.579 --> 00:54:20.967 there among officers. I think the officers are time servers. They're there 00:54:21.000 --> 00:54:24.836 for the, the good career and the possibility to go on the board of an 00:54:24.869 --> 00:54:28.865 insurance company later. And just, uh, it just, it just didn't feel right 00:54:28.898 --> 00:54:36.747 anymore. And so that's very old fashioned and corny. But uh I had a 00:54:36.780 --> 00:54:39.905 executive officer like a provost of our squadron, a man named Blanco White 00:54:39.938 --> 00:54:44.626 , wonderful name. Um, he had been a flying corporal and he got 00:54:44.659 --> 00:54:50.345 commissioned um with a temporary grade and he had 18 years and I mentioned 00:54:50.378 --> 00:54:55.006 him a minute ago, 18 years in, but his permanent rank was warrant officer. 00:54:55.039 --> 00:54:59.026 And so they reverted him to his permanent rank and that took away his 00:54:59.059 --> 00:55:05.945 flight pay and um, he couldn't retire. He just left after 18 years and he 00:55:05.978 --> 00:55:13.385 had 30,000 hours. He'd flown in four wars. I mean, this, 00:55:13.418 --> 00:55:19.206 this is the kind of professional guardian soldier that you want, I think. 00:55:19.239 --> 00:55:23.256 And uh, and they didn't and the bureaucracy of the Marine Corps didn't 00:55:23.289 --> 00:55:27.336 want him anymore. All of the people in the squadron wanted him. But there 00:55:27.369 --> 00:55:32.057 is, um, there's a Board of Regents up there running things. 00:55:32.090 --> 00:55:36.717 You write fiction. Uh, what, what do you like to read? And do you have any 00:55:36.750 --> 00:55:41.135 favorite authors? Yeah. Um, and now only because of the action, Lee Child 00:55:41.168 --> 00:55:47.767 is a very tough, very quick stuff. Um, do you know, you know Lee Child? 00:55:47.800 --> 00:55:55.106 His hero is Jack Reacher. Jack Reacher is 65 £240 and was played by Tom 00:55:55.139 --> 00:55:58.586 Cruise in the movie. That must have been Jack Reacher when he was a Cub 00:55:58.619 --> 00:56:04.865 scout. I know. What, what are they doing anyway. Um, yeah, and I have 00:56:04.898 --> 00:56:10.756 among the literary figures, um, Mark Twain, you knew that, you know that 00:56:10.789 --> 00:56:13.296 and there are two books you should read every year and one of them is 00:56:13.329 --> 00:56:17.827 Walden. Uh, and one of them is Moby Dick and they're both hard, hard, hard 00:56:17.860 --> 00:56:22.827 work and you need to read them every year. Um, and I don't, but I do, I 00:56:22.860 --> 00:56:29.425 read Walden probably every 15 months. 18. Really? Yeah. Wow. Is, it is, uh 00:56:29.458 --> 00:56:35.057 , a whole course in writing all of the Greek tropes, all of the devices of 00:56:35.090 --> 00:56:40.717 literature. Um, Thone New and also a great sense of humor in there. You 00:56:40.750 --> 00:56:44.307 don't think of him this way. The stuffy guy. But for instance, his first 00:56:44.340 --> 00:56:48.046 book a week in a Concord in Merrimack was published at at 700 copies, 00:56:48.079 --> 00:56:52.506 didn't sell, publishers said come get it. So he came and picked up all the 00:56:52.539 --> 00:56:55.635 old copies and took them home. And he told somebody once he said I have 00:56:55.668 --> 00:57:03.668 1000 books in my library. 700 of which I wrote myself. I like that. We had 00:57:04.519 --> 00:57:12.519 a speaker at a su one time. Um um His name is escaping me right now. Uh uh 00:57:13.099 --> 00:57:18.925 David Hammer. Uh Yeah, he's, he's, he wrote books on starting back in 00:57:18.958 --> 00:57:26.057 Vietnam and so on. But anyway, he was talking about um the OJ Simpson 00:57:26.090 --> 00:57:34.090 trial and the fact that a woman that had dated OJ Faye Resnick used the 00:57:34.519 --> 00:57:40.675 publicity and so on to write two books uh and make some money on the whole 00:57:40.708 --> 00:57:43.646 thing. One was OJ and me and I don't know what the other one was, but he 00:57:43.679 --> 00:57:48.986 said she had actually achieved a literary first. She had written more 00:57:49.019 --> 00:57:53.807 books than she'd read. 00:57:53.840 --> 00:57:59.467 Ok. I have, I have one OJ story, Steve Lloyd, whom you name arranged for 00:57:59.500 --> 00:58:07.500 me to play at? Uh of course in Los Angeles do on Bel Air. No, no, no. 00:58:07.639 --> 00:58:11.836 Where did, where did Tiger play? I mean, um the day, the day of the murder 00:58:11.869 --> 00:58:16.126 , uh OJ played golf. I, I was supposed to tee off at eight and I was late 00:58:16.159 --> 00:58:19.307 getting there and four guys are on the tee already and they let me tee off 00:58:19.340 --> 00:58:23.037 ahead of them and one of them was OJ Simpson and I played the course, the 00:58:23.070 --> 00:58:28.095 head of the, the day that he didn't kill his wife. Um, one of the things 00:58:28.128 --> 00:58:32.506 in life, I guess. But, uh, so I got to meet him big. Uh, I didn't remember 00:58:32.539 --> 00:58:36.756 them being that big when I saw him on television. Big head, big shoulders 00:58:36.789 --> 00:58:44.586 , big body there. Um, but so I got to see him that day and who would know 00:58:44.619 --> 00:58:47.539 ? That's right.