Oral History with Luther Brice, Interview 1, October 24, 2015 (Ms2015-007)

Luther Kennedy Brice, Jr.

Interview 1

Chemistry Professor at Virginia Tech, 1954-1986

Winner of the Wine Award and the Sporn Award

Date of Interview: October 24, 2014

Interviewer: Tamara Kennelly

Place of Interview: InnovationSpace, Virginia Tech

Transcriber: Sydney J. Vaile

Length: 1:11:19

Tamara Kennelly: Today is October 24, 2014. My name is Tamara Kennelly. I'm here

with Luther Brice to do an interview. Luther would you mind beginning by saying

your full name, and if you don't mind, stating your age?

Luther Brice: Luther Kennedy Brice, Jr., I'm eighty-six.

KENNELLY: Oh my goodness that's a surprise. Would you tell me about your family

and how you were raised?

BRICE: I was born and raised in Spartanburg, South Carolina. I've lived in

Spartanburg until I was twelve years old. During World War II, my family moved

to Columbia, and I was there for four years. I returned and graduated from

Spartanburg High School in 1945.

KENNELLY: 00:01:00Did your mother work?

BRICE: Not when I was growing up. Later she taught kindergarten. My father was a

lawyer, and he was in the military. After serving in the army in World War I, he

stayed in the military reserve, and he was called back to active duty in 1940,

which is why he had to close down his law firm and move to Columbia where he was

in the Selective Service System during World War II.

KENNELLY: Oh, I see. And do you have siblings?

BRICE: I have one brother who is still with us. He is an architect (now retired)

and lives in Charlotte, North Carolina.

KENNELLY: Oh, okay. Where did you go to college?

BRICE: I was an undergraduate at Harvard, and from there I went to Dartmouth

College where I got a master's degree, and from there to Duke University where I 00:02:00finished and got a Ph.D.

KENNELLY: How did you get your interest in chemistry?

BRICE: It came very early. I had a chemistry set when I was ten years old

[laughter]. I think that I started out planning to go into medicine, but as I

studied the subject, I got more interested in the fundamentals of the science

and in its application in medicine.

KENNELLY: I see. And were you more interested in research or teaching?

BRICE: I think teaching, and that was true from the beginning. I had a research

program during the first probably fifteen or twenty years, but I never had more

than a few graduate students, so I really focused on 00:03:00undergraduate teaching.

KENNELLY: You had a good career. I have 1954-1986 you were teaching at Virginia Tech.

BRICE: I came to Virginia Tech a little over sixty years ago. Actually it was

almost sixty years to the day when I was in Blacksburg visiting with some of my

colleagues this past spring.

KENNELLY: Oh my goodness. You mean sixty years--

BRICE: Exactly sixty years ago last spring. When I first arrived in Blacksburg.

And hiring back in those days was very different from today. I was recommended

by faculty at Duke. I drove up 00:04:00to Blacksburg, was interviewed by the department

head. There was an informal social that afternoon which I went to. Afterwards I

went with the department head back to his office, and he made an offer that day,

and I accepted. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Right there? Wow.

BRICE: [laughter] Now it takes months.

KENNELLY: Oh yeah--all kinds of negotiations, wow! So you must've liked the look

of the place?

BRICE: Oh yes, I seemed to fit. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Who was it that hired you?

BRICE: The department head--it was Dr. John Watson, and he retired just a few

years after I arrived. He was near retirement when I came.

KENNELLY: 00:05:00Were you in the military?

BRICE: No, I would get draft notices, just like everybody else. I was seventeen

in 1945 when the War ended, so I was not eligible for the draft during the

Second World War. After that, the draft went on for some years, and you would

continue getting draft notices until you were twenty-six. Each time that I got a

draft notice, one of my teachers or professors would write a recommendation that

I continue as a professional, and it was accepted. Most of my contemporaries

also didn't go into the 00:06:00 military.

KENNELLY: Your contemporaries who were in academia?

BRICE: Who were my age and went to college.

KENNELLY: I see. How did you find Harvard?

BRICE: I was recommended through a Harvard graduate who lived in Spartanburg,

and I think that was one of the major factors getting me into the college. But I

don't know, I just liked the idea of going to Harvard. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Yeah, sure! Did you like it when you were there?

BRICE: Oh yes. It was my favorite time in life almost as a student, an

undergraduate student.

KENNELLY: Had you come out at that point?

BRICE: No, no. I didn't come out until I was in my late thirties. Which was very

common back in those 00:07:00 days.

KENNELLY: How do you identify yourself?

BRICE: As a gay male.

KENNELLY: And were you aware of that?

BRICE: Oh yes, I was aware that I was attracted to boys when I was twelve,

thirteen years old. I don't know think I knew a word for it, but I knew that

attraction was there.

KENNELLY: And at Harvard, were there any social networks or way to get together

with other people who were gay?

BRICE: They were underground, and I never found it.

KENNELLY: You didn't?

BRICE: No. I've recently met a classmate of mine who did come out. I shouldn't

say come out--who found the underground 00:08:00gay connections at Harvard. But like I

said, it was all underground. I recently read a book about an incident that

happened at Harvard around 1920 where the president appointed a committee to

find homosexuals who were among the student body, and when they were found, they

were dismissed.

KENNELLY: Wow, oh my gosh.

BRICE: That was very common back in those days. I wasn't aware of that

particular incident when I was a student. Back in those days, the subject was

hardly ever discussed in public. It wasn't in newspapers, magazines, 00:09:00radio. It

just was something people didn't talk about, which, of course, made it much more

difficult for a kid like me to figure out what's going on.

KENNELLY: Right, or to know where the gathering place might be, if there was a

restaurant or bar--

BRICE: I don't think that there were any back in the thirties and forties. I did

later learn that there were no gay bars, but there were bars where gay people

kind of recognized each other once you learned the system. The system was to

have a red handkerchief in your back left pocket, and that was a signal. But I

didn't know about that [laughter].

KENNELLY: And most people don't normally carry a red handkerchief around with 00:10:00them. So then you went from Harvard, did you say, Dartmouth?

BRICE: Yes, Dartmouth, I was there for two years and also no gay connections.

KENNELLY: And what about Duke?

BRICE: Same thing there. I didn't know anyone who was gay, and there was no

openly gay activity, or anything like that. No gay student group or anything.

KENNELLY: So it would be difficult, I would imagine.

BRICE: That's the reason why people during that generation and for the previous

ten thousand years [laughter] didn't have any real opportunity to come out. Now

there were people in my generation, and, of course, in all past history, where

they were sexually 00:11:00active, but it was all underground. It was the sort of thing

you didn't read about or know about.

KENNELLY: Do you recall the title of that book you were mentioning? Otherwise I

can ask you on a later date.

BRICE: I can email that. [Note: Dr. Brice emailed the citation: William Wright,

Harvard's Secret Court: The Savage 1920 Purge of Campus Homosexuals (New York:

St. Martin's Press, 2005). LD2160 .W75 2005]

KENNELLY: Would you tell me about your, and of course if any question seems

inappropriate please say--you know. [laughter]. Will you talk about your earlier

experiences with sexuality or gender?

BRICE: Well the first time that I met anybody was at a bar in Washington. I

found out about this through an organization, and I have kind of forgotten how I

found out about it. But there was an 00:12:00organization in Washington that I got in

contact with when I found out about them, and they gave me the addresses of some

gay bars. Back in those days, like in the State of Virginia, it was illegal to

serve alcohol to a homosexual. That was written into the law. It was also of

course in let's see 1969 when that incident took place in New York City

[Stonewall Riots] where the police raided a gay bar, and there was a riot, a

protest, of the gay people in the bar. Anyhow, that's how I found out 00:13:00 about--

and that's where I met the first person that I knew to be gay.

KENNELLY: Around how old were you at that time?

BRICE: About mid-thirties.

KENNELLY: Oh my goodness, so it was probably welcome to have found some kind of network?

BRICE: Yeah. I'll tell you another incident, and this happened in 1960. My

department head came in my office one day and said, "Did you hear about

professor so-and-so?" I have forgotten his name, although I knew him. He was a

faculty member in the College of Architecture. I said, no I hadn't heard

anything. He said, "He was fired, dismissed overnight." I said, "Oh my goodness

what was the problem?" He looked at me, and he said, "Homosexuality." Of course,

I was so unnerved that I don't even remember 00:14:00the rest of that conversation. He

had no idea about my sexual orientation, or anybody else's as far as I could

tell back in those days. So this was another reason to stay underground, because

that could have happened to me.

KENNELLY: So that professor was fired just for --

BRICE: That's right. Of course, the same thing had been going on with the

federal government during the 1950s. If you were employed by the government in

any kind of position that was in any way sensitive, and it was found that you

were homosexual, you were fired because of the thought that people could

blackmail you. That you would be subject to blackmail if you had any kind of

important information.

KENNELLY: More than anybody 00:15:00else. So that would make you quite nervous about

coming out--

BRICE: Oh yes absolutely.

KENNELLY: There has been some, just talking about words and the words people

use, and I wonder what words seem appropriate to you. You said gay and

homosexual. You said both of those words. Do both of those words seem

appropriate to you? I wonder about the word queer, there is a little debate

about that.

BRICE: Well that's a little derogatory of course, but gay people will refer to

each other as queer in the same way that a black guy will call another black guy

a nigger. They make fun of it, but it's 00:16:00still clearly derogatory.

KENNELLY: So it would be considered derogatory?

BRICE: Oh yes.

KENNELLY: What was your experience of coming out?

BRICE: Well as I said, my first experience was in Washington, and then I found

out about this gay bar in Roanoke.

KENNELLY: And that was when you were here at Virginia Tech?

BRICE: Oh yes. Like I said, I arrived in Blacksburg in 1954, and my first gay

bar in Roanoke I didn't go until somewhere around late 1960s. It was there that

I met for the first time people that I 00:17:00knew on the faculty at Virginia Tech who

were gay. They didn't know I was gay either.

KENNELLY: And nobody knew, no one was--

BRICE: Yeah that's right. That's how we found out about each other was going to

this bar in Roanoke.

KENNELLY: Do you recall the name of it?

BRICE: I have a record of it, I can't think of it right now.

[Brice addendum: The bar was in the basement of what was then Tradewinds

Restaurant, 717 Franklin St. SW, Roanoke, VA.]

KENNELLY: Was that the one where you had to go down to the basement? And the

drinks cost more downstairs?

BRICE: Oh yeah, so did you read the little article that I wrote?

KENNELLY: No! I would love to read it.

BRICE: Oh, well I have it with me. I will try to get Mark to bring it. But

that's how I found out about the gay community in Blacksburg, and this would

have been in the early seventies.

KENNELLY: Tell me about, if you don't mind repeating what was in the 00:18:00 article,

drinks were more expensive there, right?

BRICE: Yes. It was in the basement of a building, and I've kind of forgotten

what was on the main floor. But that faced onto a major street, and the only way

you could get into this bar downstairs was to go all the way around the

building, down a dark alley, and go down several steps to get into this bar downstairs.

KENNELLY: So it could be dangerous just to get in there.

BRICE: Yes. [laughter]

KENNELLY: But I imagine then you go down there, and was there a good amount of

people that were there?

BRICE: Always a big crowd of people

KENNELLY: It must've been a relief to find some people.

BRICE: Oh, absolutely. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Plus there were people from your 00:19:00own community, from Blacksburg.

BRICE: Yes, that's right. That's the way I found out that they were just like me.

KENNELLY: How did you find out about the bar? Did it just happen that someone

mentioned it?

BRICE: That's a good question. I came across a book, and this again would have

been in the late sixties, that listed the locations of gay bars all over the

country. I can give you the name of that book also. I still have a copy of that.

But this was back when these gay bars first began appearing, when the whole 00:20:00situation began to change, slowly. It was a major change, and it was from that

book that I found out about this bar in Roanoke.

[Note: Dr. Brice emailed the citation: John Francis Hunter, The Gay Insider: USA

(New York: Stonewall Publishing Company, 1972).]

KENNELLY: It must have been good to find out. Were your family and your friends

back home, were they aware that you were gay?

BRICE: There is no question whatsoever that at some point all of them put two

and two together, but I have never openly discussed it.

KENNELLY: Oh, it's just never been discussed.

BRICE: The only time that the subject of gay has come up between me and my

family was a recent visit from my niece, who is in her late forties now and has

children that are teenagers. 00:21:00She grew up and is still a very devout Christian,

but she brought up the subject of gay marriage and made it clear that she's okay

with it. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Really! Wow. Well she took a step.

BRICE: And there is no question whatsoever that my brother and his children and

all of my cousins. I'm sure that they know, even though it is not--we never

discussed it.

KENNELLY: Well what are your feelings about marriage yourself?

BRICE: I'm in favor of gay marriage.

KENNELLY: Are you married?

BRICE: No. I never married, and in fact, even when I was in high school, I

didn't date girls.

KENNELLY: And you didn't marry a man, either?

BRICE: No, no I have not gone through that procedure. I had a partner for about

fifteen 00:22:00years. So I had a long-term relationship. Marriage wasn't even possible

back then anyway.

KENNELLY: So it wasn't even anything that would be discussed or anything?

BRICE: No, no.

KENNELLY: Are you in D.C. now?

BRICE: I am in Washington, D.C.; that's right.

KENNELLY: But when you were living in Blacksburg, you didn't have a partner at

that point, did you?

BRICE: Yes, the last ten years I was at Blacksburg, I had a partner.

KENNELLY: So by then, things had opened up or changed?

BRICE: By the mid-seventies or eighties there were still homophobic people on

the faculty and the administration. But I was perfectly comfortable with people

knowing that I was gay. I didn't advertise it or 00:23:00make a deal of it. In fact,

with my colleagues, with one exception, the subject was never discussed, just

like with my family. But it was no question whatsoever that many or most of them

knew, and had no problem. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Oh, good. What were the things that in your first years at Virginia

Tech when you were meeting people in Roanoke and everything, were there issues

that stand out that you all would be discussing or debating or talking about?

Any particular issues?

BRICE: You mean relating to gay?

KENNELLY: Yes.

BRICE: No, that subject never came up. It was just never discussed. And it was

only in the sixties when I think I recall seeing the 00:24:00first article in Time

Magazine that had a cover story on homosexuals.

KENNELLY: And so that must have been sort of revolutionary.

BRICE: Oh yeah, oh yes. That was one of the steps leading to where we are now.

But prior to that, I can remember when I was a kid, I ran across the term

homosexual in the dictionary. I think I had heard the word, "What is that? What

is that word?" So I looked it up in the dictionary; that's how I found out.

Because like I said, today it's all over the news. The younger generation now,

all of them know about gay people. The word gay didn't exist in 1930 or 1940 or 1950.

KENNELLY: So when you saw that word in the dictionary, did you think, "Oh well, 00:25:00that's what I am?"

BRICE: Well when I saw the word homosexual, I said, "Yes, that's me."

KENNELLY: So then you identified with that. There must have been a bit of a

feeling of--

BRICE: Isolation, yes absolutely, because I didn't know anybody else who was

like me. Ultimately, I would read about people who throughout history have been

known to be homosexual. I don't recall any public figures that were out as being

gay even back in those days.

KENNELLY: Oscar Wilde, but that's--Yes, it was just a whole different time. It

seems like it would be quite difficult though to feel that you 00:26:00are different, or

isolated, and what are you going to do? And now you hear that there is 6 percent

or 10 percent or whatever the population is, but --

BRICE: Now I do know people who are my generation and earlier generations who

developed gay relationships early in their life. But it was again kept

underground. They weren't out as homosexual or gay. But they did somehow manage

to get into this underworld, and then they lived in two different worlds. One

world doesn't know about the other one. The big 00:27:00world doesn't know about--

KENNELLY: Right, so you have this kind of different identity, and then you have

the face that you put on in the other one. You probably get invited to dinner,

and they bring a lady--

BRICE: But I know many of my other gay contemporaries who were like me, came

out, or had their first contact with the gay world at a much older age. And I

know people even who didn't work their way into the gay world until they were in

their fifties.

KENNELLY: I guess it depends on the circumstances and helps to be a reader.

[laughter] So was that bar in Roanoke homosexuals and lesbians? Was it men and

women both who went to it or was it primarily male?

BRICE: I think both. Both the 00:28:00male and female I think pretty much developed

along the same line.

KENNELLY: As time went on, was there any place in Blacksburg that was a

gathering place in that way?

BRICE: There were social groups, and they would meet at people's houses and

places like that. I don't know. I don't think there was any --there was no gay

bar in Blacksburg. There are bars now, and in fact when I was in Blacksburg

several months ago, I went to a kind of a nightclub. There were girls dancing

with girls, boys dancing with boys, boys dancing with girls.

KENNELLY: Here in Blacksburg?

BRICE: Oh yes. [laughter] So it is a 00:29:00brave new world.

KENNELLY: Where was that? Do you remember which one that was?

BRICE: It's on that street, what's the street with the Lyric Theater?

KENNELLY: College Avenue.

BRICE: Yeah it is street off of that, I think.

KENNELLY: Oh, did you go downstairs?

BRICE: No, it's not down the stairs. It was just off of the street.

KENNELLY: Things are changing. Were there any underground publications that you

were aware of?

BRICE: Those began again in the late sixties that I first became aware. Let's

see, it would've been the late sixties or early seventies where there 00:30:00 were

underground publications.

KENNELLY: Any that were local?

BRICE: No. The one I subscribed to was centered in Chicago, and it was just a

place where gay people could give their name and some way of contacting them

just to meet other gay people.

KENNELLY: Did you experience during your time at Virginia Tech, well I guess you

knew about that one professor, so that in a way is scary. But did you ever

experience any discrimination because of your sexuality?

BRICE: Well of course because there couldn't have been any discrimination

because nobody knew about it until the 1970s. After that, I was not aware of any 00:31:00personal discrimination or feelings toward me. There were people on the Board of

Visitors, who were homophobic, and there probably people on the faculty who are

too, but I just never came aware of it personally myself. So, I never had

anybody in Blacksburg or anywhere else for that matter who expressed any

homophobic statements of feelings or anything like that.

KENNELLY: When you mention the Board of Visitors, are you referring to the

incident when Shelli Fowler came? Or is there another--

BRICE: Yes, that's how I knew about the homophobia on the Board.

KENNELLY: Yeah, 00:32:00well, that was pretty blatant. I think that was a shock.

BRICE: Yeah, I even wrote the rector, John Rocovich. I wrote him a letter

expressing my outrage. I met John when he was about twenty. His mother was in

administration--admissions office. And I knew her; she was in that position when

I first came to Blacksburg. Her son happened to be with her one day when they

were in Davidson Hall, and I think that's the only time I remember seeing him or

meeting him. Then of course, I knew who this John Rocovich was [laughter] when

his name appeared 00:33:00on the Board of Visitors forty years later.

KENNELLY: Do you have a copy of that letter? Because we would love to get a

copy. Maybe we could scan the letter and give it back to you or something?

BRICE: Yes. Okay. Well I actually brought a copy of that letter and also my

statement I gave you about when the department head came in one day. I have both

of those and I will give you a copy.

KENNELLY: Oh, great. I appreciate that.

Was there anyone who was a mentor to you?

BRICE: No, I wouldn't say so.

KENNELLY: Or anyone who was especially influential or a major ally?

BRICE: No, no. 00:34:00Now you're talking about coming out as gay?

KENNELLY: Or in your career.

BRICE: Well yeah, I had teachers who were influential, and I'm sure when I was

much younger that I had mentors that guided me along in my profession. But I

don't think anything in the way of guidance that had anything to do with sexual orientation.

KENNELLY: I'm just wondering looking at your life if there was somebody who was

really important in that way. As you did your work, someone in your work who had

served in that 00:35:00 way.

When you were at Virginia Tech, did you participate in any organizations?

BRICE: Well, of course there were professional chemistry organizations, but I

got to know a good many gay students who-- In fact, Mark Weber was one of the

early organizers of the gay student group. I went to some of their socials and

affairs, and I had a place out at Claytor Lake where a lot of students would

come out 00:36:00and visit over the weekend. Sometimes a pretty big crowd-- So I was

socially involved.

KENNELLY: So you were hosting gatherings? How did you meet those students? Was

that from going to Roanoke?

BRICE: No, I think I met most of them through the Lambda Horizon group, which

Mark Weber was an early organizer of.

KENNELLY: So that would be the eighties?

BRICE: Yes, in the eighties. I met a number of gay students even in the

mid-seventies, or maybe a little earlier. But I would meet them at socials and

people's houses around town--other gay 00:37:00people. I would have gay socials in my apartment.

KENNELLY: I guess once you figured out who the network was, then you could have

your own--

BRICE: Oh yes, it was very active. It began to be a very active social group of

faculty and students. Again, starting in the sixties.

KENNELLY: I think the Gay Alliance drafted its constitution in 1971, and of

course it had to struggle to get recognition. I don't think it got recognition

until -- the university was trying to -- We've got some documentation about how

the university was trying to not recognize it, but allow it to meet. It was kind

of weird.

BRICE: Yes, there was a problem.

KENNELLY: The fact that it was at least 00:38:00trying to have an organization, did that

seem really important at the time?

BRICE: Yes, it did. The student groups became more and more active. They were

more active back in the eighties than in the early seventies. I know students

who-- this would've been maybe back in the mid-seventies-- who had part-time

jobs in Blacksburg. They lost their job because they were gay.

KENNELLY: Really?

BRICE: That was very common back in those days.

KENNELLY: Wow, in the seventies?

BRICE: Yes. Absolutely. Though, the seventies was a period of slow transition.

The 00:39:00year that is cited as the beginning of the Gay Revolution was 1969, when

that riot in the New York bar took place.

KENNELLY: Because people--

BRICE: That made big news.

KENNELLY: And people responded to it.

BRICE: They responded to it. That's right.

KENNELLY: And then there was-- I'm trying to think of the name of that--the New

York situation [Stonewall Riots]. But the fact that people were losing a job in

Blacksburg because of-- I guess it was very--

BRICE: Yes, in fact, I just talked to this friend of mine who now lives in

Washington who told me the story of what happened to him when he was a student.

I have forgotten the job that he had, but he told me they 00:40:00found out that he was

gay. Then he was fired, but the reasons that they gave for firing him, had

nothing to do with his being gay. They didn't want it to appear that he was

being fired because he was gay. So they just made up things, reasons that made

no sense for the reasons for dismissing him from his job.

KENNELLY: Was that from a private business in town?

BRICE: Yes.

KENNELLY: At that one meeting we had, someone was talking about how the gay

students for a while were getting together around a soap opera. Because there

was something about how you couldn't meet? You know, gay people weren't allowed

to even have a meeting. They would have to call the police first?

BRICE: Well, I don't recall that.

KENNELLY: Maybe I've got it mixed 00:41:00 up.

BRICE: The earliest incident which is similar to what you just said, was a

couple of students that I met-- I think this would have been in the early

seventies-- and they told me that there was a group of gay students who met in

an apartment over on Progress Street. They were very careful at night. They

pulled the shades all the way down so that nobody could look in and just see

that there were just boys there. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Did they think that someone might call the police or something?

BRICE: Yeah! But they were that concerned that something might happen.

KENNELLY: Yeah, 00:42:00maybe it was something that Mark had said about they had to call

the police before they met so that they could have a meeting? That it was so

hard to even just get together if you wanted to have a meeting. Does that sound familiar?

BRICE: I don't recall that.

KENNELLY: Yeah, I will have to check. But wow, they had to pull the shades.

That's very difficult. What, for you, are the sources of your personal strength

as a person?

BRICE: [laughter] That's a hard question. I don't know quite how to answer that.

KENNELLY: Does church or religion play a part in your life?

BRICE: No, it never has, even though when I was a kid, I went to Sunday school

and 00:43:00church every Sunday. Somehow it just didn't stick or sink in. Both of my

parents were raised in very strict Christian households. I remember my mother

told me that on Sunday they'd go to Sunday school and church, and then they'd

come home. They couldn't go out and play, and they couldn't read the newspapers,

the funnies. They would sit around and talk and read the Bible and stuff like

that. When my mother and her siblings escaped from that, they didn't pursue that

system themselves.

I remember when I was a kid, we'd go to church and Sunday school and all that,

and my father would say grace at 00:44:00meals, and I would say a prayer going to bed.

But that was it. The subject of religion, God, and all of that never came up in

the daily activities or conversation or any of that. The way it did in some

other very deeply religious households.

KENNELLY: I guess the way they had experienced it, maybe because of their own

experiences-- What are your thoughts on parenting? You don't have any children

or you didn't ever adopt children or anything, did you?

BRICE: No. What was the question?

KENNELLY: Well I just wondered what your thoughts are on parenting were?

BRICE: Well, I thought that my parents were perfect parents from the point of

view that I just described. That is, they let me do what I wanted to do. They

didn't try to guide 00:45:00me professionally. They let me develop my own interests.

KENNELLY: They must have been proud of you too! Going to Harvard, getting a

Ph.D. Have you been involved in any political or social movements associated

with LGBT or gay issues or anything like that?

BRICE: Nothing-- not really active. My involvement when I was in Blacksburg, my 00:46:00last twenty years in Blacksburg would have been social. I was never active or

got into any kind of political activity. I'm probably kind of that way now. I

still don't really get involved. I have some friends who are, and on occasion

invited me to attend political functions. I'll go, but that's not one of my

driving interests.

KENNELLY: But you were a host to these gatherings. I think there's even in

Mark's collection there is an invitation to a gathering that was at your Claytor

Lake place.

BRICE: Oh yeah, I have done a lot of 00:47:00social stuff like that. In fact, just a

couple of weeks ago there were some gay students from Virginia Tech who came to

Washington, and I had a social for them. Mark Weber and I did.

KENNELLY: That's really nice.

BRICE: You know John Gray?

KENNELLY: I know the name.

BRICE: He had organized this, and he brought this group to Washington. Mark and

I had sponsored this social for them.

KENNELLY: I suppose because in your background where you didn't really have

until finally you found this place in Roanoke or you found a place in D.C., not

having had those opportunities, you can recognize how meaningful it is for

people to be 00:48:00able to meet other people.

I think after talking a little bit, I think I understand more about the Gay

Alliance and the trouble of having a faculty sponsor for that group. I mean that

was part of the problem. I don't know if Lambda Horizon had trouble finding a

faculty sponsor--

BRICE: I think they did. I had actually forgotten this. A friend of mine who was

a student here at the time, said that he approached me and wanted to know if I

would consider being a faculty sponsor. He said that I told him that I thought

that the faculty sponsor should be a straight faculty member. I don't remember

that conversation at all, but at any rate, the first faculty 00:49:00sponsor was a

straight guy, who was perfectly open, obviously, and was supportive of the gay community.

KENNELLY: But it made it easier maybe. If we're still finding bias at the

university as late as 2003, then I could see that would make--

BRICE: I think that it wasn't that I was worried about the bias. It's just that

I am not a politically oriented person. It's just not my thing. I don't think I

would've done a good job at it. Like I said, the first faculty sponsor was an

openly 00:50:00straight supporter of the gay community.

KENNELLY: Do you recall Denim Day? In 1979 they had something they called Denim

Day, and I think people wore denim who were gay or who supported?

BRICE: I have a vague recollection of that.

KENNELLY: I think there was some harassment at that by some Corps members. I was

just wondering if you had any recollection of that.

BRICE: No, not really.

KENNELLY: What was the impact of the AIDS epidemic on your life?

BRICE: Only that some of my very close friends were victims of it. So that's the

most serious impact 00:51:00on me personally.

KENNELLY: It really impressed me how it seemed that Lambda Horizon formed, and

then they jumped into AIDS education. It was formed, and by its charter it

seemed like a group to get a positive image and a social group. Then I guess

because the AIDS situation was so serious, and they just felt that they had to--

They did this strong work in advocacy, I guess because of that.

Were you a mentor to other people, younger people?

BRICE: A mentor to other gay students?

KENNELLY: Yeah, or to straight students?

BRICE: Oh yes, oh 00:52:00yes. I got a number of undergraduate and graduate students,

and a fairly good number of them have gotten in touch with me ten, twenty,

thirty, forty years after they graduated.

KENNELLY: Have they been telling you what happened and--

BRICE: I have really kept in touch with a fair number of former students.

KENNELLY: That must be gratifying to hear.

BRICE: Oh it is! It is wonderful to know that you had that kind of influence.

KENNELLY: On someone's life, yeah. That's a big thing.

BRICE: And this is both gay and straight.

KENNELLY: Oh yeah, that's what I meant. I meant 00:53:00just professionally, or

personally too. I just wondered professionally because you mentioned that your

focus was on education, doing some research, but especially on education. It's

great when you feel like you really made a difference on people.

Are there any other events that you recall of significance as far as the gay

history of the community?

BRICE: I can't think of any specific event at the moment.

KENNELLY: Once you 00:54:00retired, was that when you decided to leave Blacksburg?

BRICE: Yes, I was in Virginia Tech from 1954 to 1986, so thirty-two years. When

I retired at Virginia Tech and moved to Washington, I taught at American

University for another eight years.

KENNELLY: How was that experience?

BRICE: It was fine. It worked fine. I was an adjunct professor, which means they

don't pay you very much. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Right, you don't get the same benefits

BRICE: But your only responsibilities are to teach the class. You don't have any

committees or any other kind of activity. By that time in my 00:55:00career, that fit it

and worked okay.

KENNELLY: You felt better to live in D.C. than to be in Blacksburg?

BRICE: Well, I had a very fine life and a lot of friends and stuff to do in

Blacksburg, but there was a point where I wanted to live in a city and

experience big city life.

KENNELLY: That is not here.

BRICE: Plus, I had a lot of friends who lived in Washington, mostly Virginia

Tech connections.

KENNELLY: Oh so there was kind of a circle there?

BRICE: There still are. Even just in my neighborhood.

KENNELLY: Oh that's nice.

BRICE: 00:56:00So, yes, it has worked out.

KENNELLY: So a huge difference from when you probably first went to Washington

to what it's like now.

BRICE: Oh dramatic change, that's right. In particular in my neighborhood,

dramatic changes from a slum to world class stores and restaurants. Everything.

KENNELLY: What neighborhood is that?

BRICE: Near DuPont Circle.

KENNELLY: That's a nice neighborhood. That was sort of a slum for a while?

BRICE: It wasn't DuPont Circle, but a few blocks east, around 14th Street.

That's when the Martin Luther King riots, you know when he was slaughtered or

murdered. They marched up and down 14th Street 00:57:00and tore down or burned down or

destroyed it. All sorts of damage up and down the street, rioting up and down

the street, and that kind of spread out into the neighborhood on either side.

I'm a few blocks west of that. So the DuPont Circle has been for as far back as

I know upscale.

KENNELLY: When you come back here to Blacksburg, what are the changes that

really stand out to you now that you are coming back? You know, after having

been here since the fifties.

BRICE: Well of course I have been back every year since.

KENNELLY: Oh you have?

BRICE: Yes. So I keep in touch with my colleagues, and I have friends in

Blacksburg that I visit and keep in touch 00:58:00with. So I've come down regularly and

watched and observed the change. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Kind of over time, yeah.

BRICE: It's now what, 30,000 students, I think. When I arrived, there were less

than 5,000.

KENNELLY: Wow, that in itself, and more fields and things I suppose.

BRICE: Dramatic. Amazing change.

KENNELLY: Are there changes that you'd like to see at Virginia Tech that you

haven't seen? Ways that you think things could be better here, or things that

bother you? 00:59:00It doesn't have to be about LGBTQ, but just in any kind of area?

BRICE: I think they ought to bring tuition down. [laughter] That's true at

schools all over the country.

KENNELLY: Well, it's become a big problem for students.

BRICE: Oh, I know people now who when they graduate, they're $100,000 in debt.

KENNELLY: The jobs don't match that.

Are there things that you would like to bring up that I haven't asked you about,

things that you wanted to mention?

BRICE: I can't think of anything right off hand. I will 01:00:00get a copy to you of

those two things though.

KENNELLY: That would be great. Do you have other letters or memorabilia or

scrapbooks or photographs?

BRICE: I have all sorts of stuff, but I don't know that it is all that relevant,

like letter and notes from former students and stuff like that.

One of the memorable things that happened to me when I was teaching was that it

was my custom at the beginning of the lecture to rap for attention with a meter

stick. I walked into class one day, and this was in the Davidson Hall

auditorium, and my meter stick was 01:01:00 missing.

All of a sudden the class gets quiet--about 130 or 140 students, and these three

students walk in the back door with a 15-foot piece of lumber. And they walked

down the steps, plopped it down on the lecture table up front, and it is a

beautifully designed replica of a meter stick. It was centimeters on one side,

and inches on the other. On the left at the bottom it said, "Made in O'Shag,"

which is O'Shaughnessy. In the middle it said "Merlin K. Brice Scientific

Company catalogue number 3-23-71," which was the date on which this thing was

presented. The clear implication 01:02:00was when they sat down was, "Okay, now you can

rap for attention." [laughter] So I picked this big piece of lumber up and go

"bang, bang, bang," and everyone goes into hysterics. [laughter]

These three students during the previous week had gone to a lumber yard, gotten

this big piece of lumber, took it to O'Shaughnessy where they lived, but they're

on the third floor. They couldn't get this 15-foot piece of lumber through the

door and down the hall. So they got people on the first level, second level, and

third level in windows and pulled the stick up and into the window. That's where

they did this beautiful work of art. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Oh that is wonderful!

BRICE: After class, of course, what am I going to do with this piece of lumber?

It was 01:03:00taken up to my office, and it was nailed on the wall. That's where it

stayed until I left. Then I left it behind, and somebody in the department

nailed it to the wall across from my office, which is where it stayed for 20

years. Now the building is being reconstructed, but they saved that meter stick.

I saw it when I was down here a couple of months ago. It's in storage, and when

they finish the renovation of the building, they will nail it back to the wall. [laughter]

KENNELLY: Oh I would love to get a photograph of that. I have to see if we can

get a photograph of that.

BRICE: I can send you a photo.

KENNELLY: Oh you have a photo? That's wonderful. That's really a tribute to do

all that. It's a prank, but it's 01:04:00such a sweet prank!

BRICE: That's the sort of thing that you remember. [laughter]

KENNELLY: And you would too! What a great memory. That's really a tribute, that

they would go through all of that trouble, and then they had to get up to their

room and then they had to get it back out through the windows and then march it

over there to you.

BRICE: -- Carried it across the Drillfield. [laughter]

KENNELLY: And that would be the early seventies?

BRICE: Yes. That's right.

KENNELLY: Wow, oh that's great. Well I think that's a great story and a great tribute.

BRICE: Then I used to do a chemistry magic show. This was a collection of

demonstrations I used to do in 01:05:00class. A couple of the female students went out

and got some black and red cloth, and they designed and made a magician's cloak

for me. For all of the magic shows that I put on after that, I wore this

magician's cape. [laughter]

KENNELLY: That's great! Do you have a photograph of that? Do you have one of you

wearing it?

BRICE: Yes.

KENNELLY: Well we will have to get those. Wow! It sounds like you really touched

your students.

BRICE: A few of them, maybe! [laughter]

KENNELLY: Well, quite a few! In a serious way if they carry this huge beam

across, and then to actually sew a cloak. I don't think that I 01:06:00have ever heard a

story like that. You must have made chemistry really interesting to them by the

way you handled things. Those are great stories. Are there any other stories you remember?

BRICE: I can't think of any right off hand. This chemical magic show that I did,

I was also invited to present it to Mrs. Ogliaruso's second grade class, which I

did. I think it was the year before I was invited to present the 01:07:00chemical magic

show at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in

Washington, D.C. in this huge ballroom. I had been to a few AAAS meetings, but

not many. Anyway, the magic show was presented there. The room was packed--

standing room only. Somebody who was a regular attender to those meetings said

that he had never seen a crowd this big at any lecture at the AAAS. I may be the

only person who ever gave the same lecture to a room full of professional

scientists and a room full of second graders. [laughter]

KENNELLY: To packed 01:08:00houses, wow! So the word must have been out about you as far

as a teacher.

BRICE: Well, when I would do this magic show in Davidson Hall, the auditorium

again would be packed. I have a picture of that too that I will send to you.

KENNELLY: I'd love that. Did you wear the cape?

BRICE: Oh yes.

KENNELLY: That is wonderful. I would love to see those pictures, and we can scan

them if you don't want to give them to us.

BRICE: Okay. Could I send them as an email attachment? Or through the mail? Or

what would be the best way to send the pictures?

KENNELLY: Probably the best way would be if we could get the physical ones

because we could make a high quality scan. We like to make scans at 600 01:09:00 DPI.

BRICE: The only thing that I could do would be to scan it myself and then print

out the scan and send it. Or I could just email you.

KENNELLY: That would be the best way.

BRICE: I think it will be as good a quality that way.

KENNELLY: That would be great, and then we could put them with the interview.

Well, it sounds like you really made a name for yourself as a teacher. If you

get this packed crowd at one of these professional meeting, that's such a funny

story. Plus the second graders probably loved it too. Was it pretty much the

same lecture?

BRICE: Not really very different.

KENNELLY: They wanted to see how you did the magic show.

BRICE: Of course 01:10:00the professional chemists would know the chemistry behind each

of the demonstrations. The second graders, of course, wouldn't know that. But

they both see the same thing.

KENNELLY: Yeah, and they were both engaged.

BRICE: When I give the lecture even to the chemists, I don't go through a lot of

technical stuff. It's entertainment, not education.

KENNELLY: That makes sense. And then when you give it to your students--

BRICE: Well, when I did the demonstrations in class, of course, there was a lot

of technical background stuff.

KENNELLY: Because they had to have it-- But you probably also made it kind of fun.

BRICE: Oh yes. [laughter]

KENNELLY: That's great. Well thank you for coming in today. These are wonderful

stories. If you think of 01:11:00other stories that you want to share, be sure to let me know.

BRICE: Okay.

[End of interview]