VT Stories Oral History with Rich and Libby Carpenter, November 19, 2016 (Ms2016-015)

ï"¿Ren Harman: This is Ren Harman. The date is November 19th, about 10:10 AM.

So, just to start with, just introduce yourself for the recording, and just tell

me a little bit about your family and growing up, and just about yourself.

Rich Carpenter: My full name is Sidney Richardson Carpenter. I'm the fourth

Sidney in the family going all the way back to the early 1800s, but none of us

have the same last name. It changes last names during that time, and my grandson

is also Sidney, as was my father who was also a Sidney. But I go by Rich, my

middle name, because it was tough having two Sidneys in the same family but one

junior. But I'm a brat, even at this age what we lovingly affectionately 00:01:00 refer

to as a military brat.

Ren: Right.

Rich: I went to 15 or 16 schools before I graduated from high school and that

was all over the United States. My father retired as a full colonel in the

United States Army. He had many assignments overseas, but unfortunately they

were what are known as TDY, or temporary duty, so we couldn't accompany him. He

spent time in Egypt, France, Germany, and Russia and Panama Canal Zone, Korea,

Japan, World World II obviously, but those were always times where it was a

short period of time or it was a combat zone so we couldn't go. But we still

moved around quite a bit given the sorts of assignments that he had, so I lived

in Virginia and a number of other states, but that is one reason I ended up here.

And this was the first place in my entire life where I lived more than 4 years,

so the new marketing campaign in the Athletic Association, the 00:02:00first time I saw

that, I said, "Yes, it is home." This is home to me. It's as much home to me as

any place. I was born in Bowling Green, Kentucky, and I have many family members

who were there at that time. I'm one of 25 first cousins, a big family, but they

are now spread all over the United States and I'm the second oldest. In fact, we

just spent time in Montana and Idaho and Washington State visiting with a couple

of my cousins out there this summer, so that was a neat thing to do.

Ren: Right.

Rich: So that's kind of the background. I graduated actually from McLean High

School in McLean, Virginia. It's in northern Virginia, so that gives you a synopsis. 00:03:00Ren: How did you kind of end up at Virginia Tech? What was the decision there?

Was it a family decision?

Rich: No. I guess I had some intention of making the military a career, my

father being career military. In my senior year in high school I applied for an

appointment to West Point but did not get an appointment. Ended up then

beginning to look at various other places that I might want to go. Virginia Tech

was one of those places, but I really didn't pursue that because my initial

decision was to go into the army right out of high school at age 17. My father

had to say that that was okay and had to sign papers. And not too long after

basic training, 00:04:00I then asked for and was sent to the United States Military

Academy Preparatory School. That prep school had a process whereby I could try

to obtain what was known as a competitive appointment to West Point. But I did

not achieve the competitive appointment either, so I had to serve out my time as

an enlisted person in the United States Army. Got out of the military, and

during that last year particularly I applied to several different places.

Interestingly enough I took courses while I was in the military and exempted my

first year of college, and then ended up coming here, which was the only place

that did not recognize those credits.

Ren: Oh my goodness. And that still happens today.

Rich: Yeah, well it's a great place. It has high standards, so I have no issue

with that.

Ren: Right.

Rich: So I ended up coming here into the Corps of Cadets, still with the

intention of making a military career. Along the way there was a little break,

the summer I got out of the Army I went back to Ft. 00:05:00Meade, Maryland where my

parents were stationed. I was there for a couple of weeks before, and that was

the longest time I had stayed with my parents basically since I graduated from

high school. I went back to their home in preparation to come to Virginia Tech.

Went to a party and met this young person over here. Then we began to date, and

we continued to date and I'll let her tell her side of the story.

Ren: Okay.

Rich: After our sophomore year we were married in Ft. Meade, Maryland, and then

in September 00:06:00we relocated here. I was still in the Corps.

My sophomore year a gentleman in my company who, as we used to say and I love

the term, I "ratted" under him and I have no issue saying that, because it's a

neat thing, because quite frankly I'll go off on a tangent for a second.

Ren: That's fine.

Rich: The guys that I still hang with now and are still my closest buddies are

my "rat brothers", about 3 or 4 of them from Virginia Tech, and we all call each

other our "rat brothers". I mean that's just the way it is. In fact, the last

football game one of them was here staying with us, he and his wife, and he was

also at graduate school with me here. So, as I said, we were married between our

sophomore and junior year. But my sophomore year an upperclassmen in my company,

Hal Schneikert asked me, he was Chief Justice of the Cadet Honor Court asked me

to be his clerk, the secretary of the Honor Court 00:07:00and obviously you say, "Yes

sir," when something like that happens.

Ren: Right.

Rich: So I became the secretary of the Cadet Honor Court, and then my junior

year I was defense attorney, and then my senior year I was justice of the Honor

Court, which led me on a unique path which I thoroughly enjoyed actually. When

we came back to campus that summer that was a unique thing. Not many cadets were

married and not many cadets had been in the service beforehand, so I ended up

living off campus. I really never asked for permission to do that. I just did

that and I don't think they really knew how to respond because there was really

no response per say.

Ren: Right.

Rich: So that's how I ended up here. 00:08:00Then at the end of my senior year I was

told that I would lose my commission unless I had another knee operation. I had

one as a sophomore I believe, and at that point I said I really don't want to

have another knee operation, so I lost my commission and did not continue the

service of an officer. I then got my release from the military and was also in

the reserves during the four years I was at Tech. So I then had a new plan. The

new plan was I had already applied to graduate school, was accepted, and went on

to graduate school. After graduate 00:09:00school I stayed here for a while in

Blacksburg working for a company, in equity investments and insurance. Then left

that and went off onto another tangent and ultimately ended up in consulting.

And then ultimately had my own consulting practice, and that's pretty much the story.

Ren: Okay. So, a couple of things, to put it kind of in the context of a year,

when you first enrolled it was early 1963?

Rich: '63.

Ren: And you graduated with your bachelor's degree in 67?

Rich: Right, and got my masters in '69. It was a masters of science in business,

not an MBA.

Ren: When you first stepped on the campus of Virginia Tech what was that moment

like? Do you remember that?

Rich: I remember the first time I visited here with my father. We drove down

from McLean, VA to campus. There were no four-lane roads down here and you had

to come through Cambria and if you've never been that way it's a very

interesting little two-lane road coming down. I remarked, and please don't take

this the wrong way, but I remarked to my father, "There must be a university

here because how else do they support the economy?" And I didn't mean any

disrespect, but I didn't see any development. I saw nothing, but yet when I

arrived on the campus I was impressed by the architecture, the limestone, what

we lovingly call Hokie 00:10:00Stone. Just the whole Lane Stadium, was not Lane Stadium,

it was still the old Miles Stadium and that was one of the older, really old

football stadiums here, but Burruss Hall and the drillfield, all of that made

quite an impression. It seemed like a very neat place.

Ren: Right. So we've had a lot of other people that we've talked to talk about

the Honor Court and about it being student ran. What was the Honor Court and

what did that mean to you? Obviously it was very proud for you to be able to serve.

Rich: The Cadet Honor Code basically says a cadet will neither lie, cheat,

steal, nor tolerate those who do. And, I guess growing up in the military and

having a bit of that sometimes it's very tough to hang with that, to really

understand and follow that. Sometimes it's very, very tough. In fact, one of my

consulting assignments I was with a company, and this was 00:11:00during the first war

in Iraq. There was some news byte where there was some indication that this

particular company had some involvement in supplying material, and I actually

reported... My contact was with the EVP of the company, the executive vice

president of the company. And the next time we met, because we met rather

frequently for me to just let him know what I was doing and where I was in the

United States and working with people overseas, and I asked about it. I said, "I

was conflicted in that this is the news report."

He then began to unfold and, in fact, 00:12:00was actually pleased that I had asked him

this question, because he said, "We take this very seriously ourselves. This is

what we've done. This is why they said what they said. We had had a relationship

through a vendor with this particular individual. This particular individual,

when this first started, ceased any involvement with us," etc., etc. So

sometimes it can create problems, particularly when one works with an

organization overseas where practices that are not condoned here are condoned there.

Ren: Right. What was your major?

Rich: I have an undergraduate bachelors of science in business with a

concentration in management, masters of science in business and tended to spend

most of my time in organizational 00:13:00 behavior.

Ren: What made the decision to have the major for your bachelor's degree?

Rich: Well the MBA was not...I think it was either finished or about to be

finished, but it was just new. I had some ideas interesting about some thoughts

regarding executive development, and so I ended up writing a thesis on that, and

that obviously was required for a master's of science at that point, so that was

why I went in that direction.

Ren: Did you have any parental influence on what you decided to major?

Rich: Actually no, there was none.

Ren: Very good. I want to give you a break. I want to hear from your partner in

crime here. If you want to introduce yourself and the same thing, tell a little

bit about your family and where you grew up and things.

Libby Carpenter: I'm Libby Carpenter. That's my real name. My "paper name" is

Elizabeth M. Carpenter. I'm also the daughter of a military officer. Rich and I

met 00:14:00because of our dads working in the same office at Ft. Meade Maryland, and

that was two weeks before I headed off to school. With my father in the military

he served with the Burma Theater in China during World War II, helping supplies

over the Hump into China, and that meant my father didn't see me until I was 16

months old.

Ren: Wow.

Libby: My mother put me on her hip as a 16-month-old baby. She was 24 and stood

up to the request of her mother, my grandfather had already passed, but stood up

to both Granny Barlow 00:15:00and her high school principal who tried to talk this

24-year-old woman out of going to China, because the military personnel was now

allowing dependents to join military in their assignments.

So we went by a train from Charlotte. I was born in Lincolnton, North Carolina.

We took a train from Charlotte to Seattle. We took a steamer ship across the

Pacific Ocean. It was the Ainsworth, the SS Ainsworth. Got into the Sea of

China, and before we could offload from the steamer ship, babies and children

were taken by coolies to the LST. My mother had to climb down the cargo rope to

get onto the LST and that's when I met my dad for the first time.

Ren: Wow.

Libby: Mom had already taught me how to salute. So we spent a year in Peking

China and were evacuated because of the Red Chinese 00:16:00coming in, and came back to

Fort Leavenworth Kansas for six months. Dad was in the Army War College there,

and then to Fort Monroe Virginia. That's where my younger sister was born. We

then headed to Bamberg and Frankfurt, Germany, where I was in kindergarten

through 2nd grade, and my brother was born there. And then we came back to

Syracuse, New York, where Dad was professor of military science at Syracuse

University, the same four years that Jim Brown played football there. That's

probably where my love of football first developed. But I finished 6th grade

there. I actually left a little bit before the end of the year.

We then went to Taipei, Taiwan where my Dad was liaison to Chiang Kai-Shek, and

then we came back to Fort Knox, 00:17:00Kentucky. I was there for 9th, 10th, and 11th

grade. Dad came home two weeks before the end of junior year to say he had

temporary duty in Panmunjom, Korea. He was one of the negotiators, so that was

the same year with the Bay of Pigs, and Dad was in limbo as to whether or not he

was staying in Panmunjom or coming to DC. It was also the first time in 25 years

that my parents had been separated.

So that senior year was miserable because we couldn't stay at Fort Knox. The

military didn't allow dependents to stay on post, so we went to Conway, South

Carolina. My Dad was a Citadel grad, and so we went to Conway outside of Myrtle

Beach. That year, I know, gave me the passion for the teaching career that I

headed into. But by the time my father got back from 00:18:00Korea, I had already

applied to Winthrop. Since South Carolina was his stateside address then I go in

state. When he came back, we moved to Fort Meade.

I guess we had been there a month when the officer's club started having parties

or gatherings for all the kids going off to college, and that's when Rich and I

met. We dated every night for two weeks. And then I headed to what we called the

nunnery to Winthrop, because at that point in 1963 it was all women. Rich sent

me a postcard from Virginia Tech after he had gotten settled in with the Corps.

I went to school on September 10th and he had to report to Virginia Tech the

22nd of September. Tech was on the quarter system, so that's why he was later.

Ren: Right.

Libby: And I sent him a note in response to that postcard. I still have the

postcard, but sent him a note saying, "I can come up for 00:19:00homecoming, but don't

feel obligated. One of my suitemates has a boyfriend at Tech, I'll come up."

Well he wrote back, 'Obligated hell, you better come.' [Laughs] Of course it was

homecoming, great big mums, and all the festivities. I had on a sweater and

skirt the color of your shirt, that light blue, Carolina blue I guess, and he

had on his Corps uniform, and the wool in my sweater got on that Corps uniform,

and they didn't have those little tapes, the lint tools at that point. But after

the homecoming dance the taxi didn't 00:20:00come and he got demerits and I finally got

back to the house out on South Main Street. It's still right there. And I got up

the next morning thinking if this is what a college weekend is all about, I

don't want anything of it. [Laughs] But then of course we kept writing and saw

each other at Christmas.

For me to transfer after we married, Virginia Tech didn't have a degree in a

foreign language. My undergraduate is in French, so I transferred from Winthrop

to Radford and commuted with the daughter of the professor from whom we rented

an apartment. Now this is a garage apartment out on North Main. One bedroom

fully furnished. One bedroom and one bath and we paid $65 a month plus utilities.

Rich: Including utilities.

Libby: Including utilities, that's right. And with Professor Calrence and his

wife Nell, 00:21:00we go back to "this is family" theme. First of all, we were family,

but then our landlord and his wife became family. Our own daughters were there

at Mrs. Trent's 95th birthday. You know it's been family that way. I was able to

finish a year early, and during that last year I started looking at what's going

to keep the roof over our heads, because we did stay in that apartment for the

first 7 years. It was too good a deal, and the rent never went up.

Ren: Wow.

Libby: I started looking at what would work and found that the State of Virginia

would let me teach on a BA degree for 4 years, but I had to 00:22:00get a recommendation

from the superintendent after I'd taught for 2 years in that school system, and

I had to go back and take 12 hours of education courses. So that's what I did.

In the process I kept coming back to what Virginia Tech had to offer me as a

professional, I was hired for the Upward Bound program and taught there for four

summers. And in that same process, found out about the NDEA Institute in

[English] the summer of '68. And that also, because I was a participant, 00:23:00I think

there were over 350 applications, but they only took in 35 or something like

that, but that gave me graduate credits, course credits, and already gave me

entry into Virginia Tech's grad school. So I was in the first group of English

majors going in for their graduate degree, and that gave me a break between,

because I spent my first 3 years, I taught in Ironto in a little 3-room

schoolhouse. Couldn't find it, tried finding it last year. I think it's been

engulfed in all the other schools in the area. And then gave myself an $800

raise by driving with ten other student wives down to Floyd County High School

and taught there for 2 years. Came back to Tech and I got my masters in English

while I was a GTA.

Ren: 00:24:00 Okay.

Libby: And then when I graduated in '71, and here's where going back to high

school, well 6th grade, I left 6th grade before my 6th grade graduation, left

8th grade before 8th grade graduation, didn't graduate with my classmates at

Fort Knox High School after being with them for 3 years. And then I graduated in

the summer quarter from Radford. I started teaching on Monday and graduated

Thursday night. And so that masters from Virginia Tech is my first, what I've

always called my "really truly" 00:25:00 graduation.

Ren: Very cool. Very cool.

Libby: So it was a wonderful 5 years, and I've always thought that those 5 years

at Blacksburg High School and working with the students who came to that high

school to include the sons and daughters of professors it was just family.

Ren: Right. And so the Blacksburg High School that you're probably referencing

is the one that now has gone right on North Main Street, correct? It's just a

big open land, right?

Libby: When we were there until, I started the fall of '71 with senior English

and French when they needed me to fill in, Edith Stockton was the French teacher

that I worked with, and then in the fall of '74 we moved into the Patrick Henry

Drive facility. It was the open concept and by Christmas we had all walls in,

but it was a wonderful, wonderful experience.

We then moved from Blacksburg. Our older daughter was born here. 00:26:00She's also a

Hokie. When she sent in her application she wrote a letter as well, even though

it wasn't required, and one of her comments, (I will just ask her permission on

the phone; she said, "Mom I don't remember." I said, "Well I do,") She put in

her letter, "I deserve to be a Hokie. I have spent more time on the Virginia

Tech campus than any student who matriculates at Virginia Tech." So she finished

her degree in interior design in '97. Our younger daughter was born in North

Carolina when we moved there and she's a Tarheel. So we have a 24-hour, like

this weekend, 24-hour moratorium; we don't talk football until after the

emotions settle back in.

Ren: Yeah, absolutely. Very cool. I'm going to turn back to you Rich, and

whenever you feel free, your time at Virginia Tech I know there had to be some

influential professors and advisors 00:27:00that you remember maybe that were pretty

impactful on your life.

Rich: Oh, I remember a Dr. White in English. He was just a great professor. He

encouraged me to write. I ended up through a long process with a minor in

English. I've actually written for the Corp Review twice and written some other

stuff along the way. I obviously did a lot of writing in my consulting practice

with the development of some intellectual property, which had I not had that

underpinning in writing, and the writing I did I wouldn't have, I don't think,

been able to do it easily. It would have been much more of a labor, although it

was laborious to get through it by yourself and getting your PhD you understand that.

Ren: Yes sir.

Rich: Or even in writing my masters thesis. But still, it gave me that kind of underpinning. 00:28:00Ren: What about for you?

Libby: With the graduate degree Dr. Tench Tilghman was my thesis committee

chair, and we all, those of us who took his Victorian poetry class met with him

in a seminar room on the top floor of Carol Newman Library. I remember one

quarter, I guess it was a winter quarter we met from 6 to 9.

And day students had to park in the far corner of the parking lot that now is

across from the Alumni Center and the Inn at Virginia Tech. It was all gravel.

And of 00:29:00course we all have war stories about walking across campus with all the

snow and so forth.

Rich: Before buses, before transportation.

Libby: Right.

Ren: No BT then.

Libby: The mentality all of us had, because we were a very close group going

through that being in the first group, we all felt that if we didn't make an A

in a course we'd fail it. You know a B was not good at all, and the first paper

that I wrote and got back, it was a B- and I was just horrified. Um, so I went

to Dr. Tilghman and talked with him about it. He shared with me his practice

that I shared with my students for all 38 years. I did always teach seniors. I'd

say 23 of 00:30:00those 38 years I was also the graduation coordinator. But what he said

was all right, because this was not his class that I had made this grade in. He

said, "I will make myself available to you. You get your paper written ahead of

time and I will be happy to sit down with you and go through the paper and we

can talk about what would make it stronger, but you have to come see me ahead of

time with enough time that you can go back and correct it," and that's what I

always did with my students.

So, Dr. Tilghman was very very encouraging. And on top of that he had 00:31:00quite some

stories to tell because we would -- I don't remember whether we started right

away, maybe it was in the second year of the program, but he and Dayton Kohler

who was in the department and Dayton Kohler is one of the co-editors of Master

Plots, so I got to write some reviews, or edit some reviews I guess. But he and

Dayton Kohler and Dr. Peacock, I want to say Dr. Peacock's first name was

Marcum, but these three gentlemen would entertain us at Dr. Tilghman's home

complete with adult beverages. I mean we all were grad students after all, but

they would share with each other their stories of their experiences as undergrads.

And Tench Tilghman and Dayton Kohler were at UVA. We forgave them for that. They

attended UVA at the same 00:32:00time that F. Scott Fitzgerald was there, and told us

some of the shenanigans that went on in the dorm and so forth. So when I would

have people question my getting a master's in English from Tech, and of course

in the 60s it was even better known for its engineering than English.

Ren: Right.

Libby: I always answered with, "I know that if I were in the market to teach on

the college level, I needed an English degree from Chapel Hill for example." But

I value those stories and that time and that encouragement that the professors

gave me and us. It was wonderful.

Rich: Her talking reminded me of a couple of professors that I had glossed over

and really need to mention them. One of them was Mayor Barringer, who was the 00:33:00Mayor of Blacksburg and also a professor, and some of his quirks really made the

class interesting. He had nicknames or pet names for not all of his students,

but a few of them. I had one which will remain unmentioned[chuckles], but one of

the things that he would do, he would bring into class the old papers and he

would crumple them up and throw them at us. He would also if he caught anyone

asleep he would pick up a piece of chalk and 'boom'. You know you can't do that

today with a smartboard.

Professor Pete Ellison was another guy. He was a law professor, which gave me an

interest in the law, which I think also helped me particularly in my senior

year, as a justice of the Honor Court, but then 00:34:00being asked in graduate school

to come back on occasion, if someone was out I could handle the class, even

though I was not an attorney. I was not reading the law or schooled in the law

as they would have said, but that was encouraging to do that. In graduate school

Professor Sang Lee who had been as I recall was from Korea. And since my dad was

the advisor to the Division and got the DSC in Korea he had some stories to

tell. DSC is Distinguished Service Cross, second only to the Medal of Honor, so

he had some stories to tell. But Sang Lee if my memory serves me correctly had

been in ROK, Republic of Korean Division as well, so he was an interesting guy.

Quantitative methods, which I can't say was my great love, but [laughs] we

managed to get through it. But there were several, and I'm sure if I 00:35:00talk longer

or just sat here and thought for a while there would be others that would come

to mind.

Libby: I know that one of the bylines that shows up in [00:36:21] education is

being a lifelong learner. And what I found in my own professional career was it

was almost as if there was a 5-year cycle. The 3 years starting with Ironto and

then going to Floyd, and I had 8th grade classes but one senior class, and then

the GTA, and I taught freshman English. Duncan Rollo was my mentor and he was

marvelous in giving my head, assuring, affirming what I was doing. Then I came

to Blacksburg High School and I was at Blacksburg High School for 5 years. Once

I came back I was out for 4 years with children and our moves, but I went back

into the classroom and here's another 5 00:36:00 years.

When I chaired the SACS steering committee in 1985, I realized that that school

wanted me to do the same thing for the next 25 years. So, I went back as the

good Lord would prepare it, I was able to go back into the public school system

and was hired as senior English teacher and graduation coordinator; I mean just

what I wanted to do. During those 5 years I was asked to participate at the

North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching and realized I hadn't been

back in the classroom for myself. So then I pursued my masters in administration

and supervision. Each time I wanted the answer to the 00:37:00question, "Is this going

to tell me why I should leave the classroom?" I never did find the answer to

that question. There wasn't a good enough one...

Rich: Well did you used to say you could teach because of what? Because I worked.

Libby: Right. I could teach because Rich worked. So I then at that point took

on, within the next 5-year cycle I took on a senior project. Is that something

you've encountered?

Ren: Not myself, no.

Libby: Okay. A program out of Oregon that was started by two teachers and our

county was going to work on it, and when that fell apart because it was top

driven rather than ground up, National Boards came along, so 5 of us of the 10

of us in the English Department 00:38:00formed a cohort and went through the National

Board Certification.

Ren: About the cohort, I'm interested, because you said you were the first

cohort, was it English masters students or female English masters students?

Libby: Do check on it, I may be wrong, I may not have been in the first group,

but I was definitely in the second group, okay, if I wasn't in that first, but

I'm thinking it's the first. Ray Smoot's wife Joyce, his first wife was in that

class, so that would give you another name.

Rich: And there were a couple of others too.

Libby: Marge Kaiser and Julia Claycombe

Ren: So these were all female students?

Libby: No, we were a mixed group. I think there were about 21 of us.

Ren: But you were the first or second 00:39:00cohort masters English students?

Libby: Right. Tech was starting a masters in English. Wilson Snipes was

department chair then. H. H. Campbell was in that group. I'm trying to remember

who the other professor was that was on my thesis committee. A funny thing about

that was when I got, so here it is the final quarter because we're still on the

quarter system in '71, final quarter and the graduate school office tells me

that I haven't met the foreign language requirement. And I had to say, "Excuse

me, I have 36 hours in French as an undergraduate major." 00:40:00"Oh, we didn't look at

that," so it was all right.

Rich: Going back, she reminded me of a dean of the College of Business, H.

H.Mitchell, and Paul Wischkaemper

Libby: Bob King.

Rich: Bob King and Dr. Brown, names started coming back when you start hearing

other references of people that were close that we counted on, as an

undergraduate there were several of us in business that didn't really see that

there was an organization to help us get more information about business outside

of our studies. There was at that point a professional business fraternity,

Alpha Kappa Psi, but we just didn't feel that from what we knew of them that

that was what 00:41:00we wanted, and we started a new organization called the Business

Administration Society.

Then I believe it was Paul Wischkaemper and [Dean Mitchell] were both delta

sigma pi, which is the other professional business fraternity. So we approached

Wischkaemper, Dr. Brown, and Dean Mitchell, and I'm trying to think of the other

ones, because I think there was at least one more, about approaching Delta Sigma

Pi and seeing if we could have a chapter at Virginia Tech, and they then

approved that. So I and a number of other guys were part of that first group of

individuals who started not only the Business Administration Society, but then

ultimately which became the Zeta Upsilon Chapter of Delta Sigma Pi, which

interestingly enough I was 00:42:00Zeta Upsilon 11. And a year or so ago, I came in for

the installation of the 1,000th brother and there's a picture of me standing

with Zeta Upsilon #1,011, and I just thought that was kind of interesting that

it still continued and it is still flourishing and doing well.

Libby: And another connection, our younger daughter, Susan, who attended Chapel

Hill became his brother in Delta Sig.

Rich: Because I was charter chancellor of this chapter and she was also the

chancellor, obviously not the chancellor of the one at Chapel Hill, because hers

I think is Alpha Lambda, but I'm not positive of that, but she was also chancellor.

Ren: So you see like the connections that Virginia Tech has obviously within

your own children.

Libby: When Shelley, our Hokie 00:43:00daughter, started her interior design classes and

the roster is being read, Dr. Anna Marshall Baker said, "Is your mother named

Libby?" So here she was...

Ren: So, you both were at Virginia Tech at an interesting time within our

history, and so can you talk about the culture and maybe the counterculture

movement, and was that present in Blacksburg?

Rich: Well, yes it was. I was in the Corps obviously as I mentioned earlier.

That was the beginning of '63 after having been in the military, a unique

situation then as well, not totally, but it wasn't prevalent. There were not a

number of people in that situation. And so a number of things were going on in

the country, as well as going on on campus. During this time between '63 and '67 00:44:00when I graduated buildings, were burned, protests were on campus, and the Corps

of Cadets under T. Marshall Hahn's presidency, that whole concept was changed

from a mandatory corps to voluntary corps. A number of people at that point and

following that became very disheartened with the university, became disheartened

with the fact that it had changed what it had been there from the very

beginning. And I have to admit early on, I was probably somewhat in that camp.

Now during, as things progressed over time it became obvious that if we as a

university were really going to progress and become this sort of university that

we really could have the potential to become, we needed to make the changes that

were being made.

Ren: Because President's Hahn's decision it was 00:45:00obviously pretty controversial

at the time.

Rich: It was very controversial at the time.

Libby: And then throw in he has a degree from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and

I have a degree from VPI and State University.

Rich: VPISU as we call it.

Libby: Yeah.

Rich: But back to the response to your question, over time then in 1991 I was

asked by Henry Decker to be on the Corps of Cadets Board of Directors. I had

just finished serving a 6-year term on the Alumni Association Board of Directors

as guys like Lowe who you have interviewed and others, Sam [00:47:22...berger]

who you interviewed. What I began to see is it's not an either/or, it's a

both/and, so how do you then really look toward the future and do those sorts of

things that are important overall. In fact, one of the committees that I chaired

when I was on the Alumni Board of Directors was looking at the concept of

diversity and what do we do. So I actually 00:46:00put together a group of graduate

students, I said I'm not really competent to do this, but I think if I would

work with some students maybe in doing that, we could get a better handle.

And interestingly enough I'm looking at what's happening on the television last

night across the country, and looking at what's taking place, and I can say that

I'm relatively proud of what we've done here. I mean there's always work to be

done, but I think what we've done here is pretty good. Now back to my Corps

issue, things needed to change in a variety of different ways. The Corps needed

to become much more about taking what's there and breaking them down and

building them back up, but taking what's there and building them. And I think

that, particularly with the fact that the commandants I've had the great

opportunity to know, and obviously worked with to some degree being on the 00:47:00 Corp

board, have made that transition, and interestingly enough as well the

presidents that I've seen come in since I was on the Alumni Board in 90...

Libby: '90 to '96.

Rich: '90 to '96, were just exactly the right people for the time on the job.

And it seemed to me in my humble opinion that the individuals that came in built

upon their predecessors' work, whether it was intentional or not, but it was

very well done. It was like this foundation stone was set in place then the next

foundation stone was set in place, and each time that new stone was set in place

it was not at the same level. It was at the next level like you were building a

stair step. And the same thing I would also say is true of the Corps of Cadets.

We recognize that it's clearly an integral part of the university, but that's

not the overall function. That's not what we need to be doing as a university,

and we 00:48:00should not be taking young people and trying to break them down. We

should be trying to take young people to build them into the leaders of

tomorrow, and I think that's what we're doing.

Ren: Absolutely.

Libby: I'm just thinking in terms of as we've gone thorugh those changes,

tomorrow will mark a point for the two of us in that we will go to Pearson Hall's...

Rich: Dedication.

Libby: Dedication. And when I first came to Virginia Tech that very first time,

come down the Mall, of course there's no Torgersen you know, and it was the

brick dorms, Rasche and Brodie and the car I was in pulled up to the curb, and I

don't know how Rich saw me, but he ran down the steps.

Rich: I "dragged" down those steps 00:49:00 too.

Libby: You "dragged," yes. [Laughs] And so the campus for me was just marvelous

and what, we went to a Peter, Paul & Mary concert in Burruss Hall, and it was

that kind of... Maybe it wasn't that first weekend, it was another time. But to

go to Pearson Hall tomorrow for its dedication, and for me the cadets finally

have a facility they deserve. Oh my goodness. Now, we have since 1995 had a

tailgate for Rich's former company, E Company.

Rich: So for 20 years, in fact if you want to see the picture up on the wall,

for 20 years we've brought all the cadets from my former company to one game in

the fall, fed them, because when I was on the Corps Board my thought was we need

to find a 00:50:00way to interact with the people who are currently cadets.

Libby: So they know how to act when they meet with alumni.

Rich: For 20 years it's been the same routine. The freshman will always stay

over here together. They are really afraid to come talk to the alumni. They

don't want to interact. The sophomores are like they will come talk and then

they will leave. The juniors and seniors, 'Tell us what it was like. Tell us how

we can learn. Tell us what we can do.' In fact tonight we're entertaining the

company commander for E Company and the take over a major leadership position

next year. The [00:52:29 ex] we would have had here tonight, but he's got a class.

Ren: Oh, okay. Yeah, I heard about someone's brownies I believe.

Rich: Oh yeah. They are good brownies.

Libby: How did you hear about that?

Ren: A little research.

Libby: Oh goodness. Well, I've got some brownies in the freezer right now

because I don't have a pan here. You know I've been using the same Pyrex.

Rich: But this year was the very first 00:51:00year that we had to go inside. Even we've

been in rain before, but with the weather forecast being high winds, and I'm

looking at a tent being taken off by a high wind I'm going you know we... So I

actually, Captain Snyder and I said, "Here's my thought." And I called my cohort

who after... Libby and I had been doing this about 5 years, the same gentleman

who asked me to be his secretary when he was Chief Justice came and said, "Can I

help with this E Company tailgate?" I said, "Well of course you can," so he's

been instrumental in that, and we've stayed connected in that regard for 20 years.

Libby: Not to mention he followed you on the Alumni Board and then on the Corps Board.

Rich: Alumni Board, then I talked to him about getting on the Corps Board so

he's now on the Corps Board.

Ren: We talked a lot about really positive and good things about Virginia Tech,

but were there some struggles when you all were 00:52:00students that you can remember

that were maybe some difficult times?

Libby: Yes. When the power would go out and...

Rich: And we were in our rented...yes. [Laughs]

Libby: In our apartment out on North Main. You know the power would go out and

we learned very quickly to get some oil lamps.

Rich: Actually I think there was already one in the apartment.

Libby: Right, and we still have one of them.

Rich: I studied by oil light.

Libby: Sharing one car, and I was in a carpool to go to Radford, but there were

times when he had the car and I needed to get to particularly biology lab, so

there were some issues with that. We could even hear the bells in the electrical

system, the bells on campus, because whatever that 00:53:00surge to ring the bells it

would come through.

Rich: Almost like the silence on a phone when it's silent but you can hear it go

'zeep zeep', exactly that same sound. You could hear it.

Libby: Now for me as a graduate teaching assistant there was that weekend, when

the students in protests with the Vietnam War burnt the ROTC building. It was a

wooden structure, but burnt it, and a group of students took over Williams Hall,

and the Blacksburg Police had to come in. Students were bodily carried out of

Williams Hall and put in a moving van and 00:54:00taken to the city jail. Well, I knew

none of this. I'm out on North Main Street all weekend, and come in Wednesday

morning for my 8 o'clock class, and Williams Hall is completely surrounded by

state troopers. And my impression was every single one of them was 6'4". They

were all standing one arm's length from each other, and every fourth state

trooper had a German Shepherd at his heel. Those of us going through to the

building had to show our IDs in order to go into the building. Very tense, very tense.

The same weekend following that episode, Rich and I went to the Lyric Theater;

had to park on the side 00:55:00street. It was overcast. I got out of the car and put

some money in the parking meter, and the dime, because it was just a dime then,

wouldn't go in the slot. Rich got out of the car...

Rich: Don't tell it.

Libby: I am telling it. With a Mary Poppins umbrella, you know, the big black

one with the metal tip and the wooden handle, grabbed it by the tip and swung to

hit the parking meter.

Rich: I hit it like this with the tip trying to get quarter... No, no, no.

Libby: But at the same time he was aiming at the parking meter. A police car

screeched to a halt. Two doors opened. One comes around and gets in Rich's face

and said, "Don't hit that thing." And Rich says right back to him, "It's not a

thing sir, it's a parking meter sir."

Rich: And the quarter won't go in or whatever.

Libby: And I thought in that split 00:56:00second that we were both going to join the students.

Rich: If you're going to tell it tell it right. I did not whack that meter. I

was trying to get the...

Libby: But that story was a story I told every year to my seniors in order to

emphasize the word 'thing' because Rich was right. There is a word. I want to

tell you, this paper is going to tell you three things about it-- So I always...

Rich: I bet [00:58:26] got back in time. [Laughs]

Libby: I think the world was such a different place then 00:57:00because in my lifetime

Betty Friedan came and spoke at Winthrop right after she had written the

Feminine Mystique, and I was in a small college with 2,400 women, and yet we

were...you know my father is military and my daughter is now my mother's story

about taking me to China. We come from strong stock. So, when you ask is there

any family influence as to where to go...

Rich: Not directly.

Libby: Not directly. I knew I was heading forth. We were...

Rich: That was part of our upbringing. You weren't going to hang around. You

were going to get gone, and I don't mean that in any disrespectful way, but you

were going to go.

Libby: So I was 20 by 3 months when we 00:58:00married and he turned 22 in November

after we married in early September. I mean it was, Virginia Tech was our world.

It was our family. It was our home. It offered us all sorts of opportunities.

Rich: In fact, we have a neighbor down the street, an Illinois graduate, where

we [01:00:00 live currently], CPA, a smart guy. His son applied to Virginia Tech

and one of the things that we encouraged this son [01:00:12] was to do

everything you can do, but just remember you are there to finish and do it well.

But if you have the opportunity to do X Y or Z, do it. Actually I've got a

little academic problem because my first years I tried doing everything and that

didn't work out.

Ren: Rat Year, is that correct?

Rich: The Rat Years are...

Libby: Sophomore year was worse.

Rich: But this neighbor's son ended up going to Alaska, I mean all of the things...

Libby: To 00:59:00Africa, as well

Rich: Yeah, it's incredible.

Libby: He was a forestry and wildlife major with a concentration in fisheries.

Ren: Wow.

Rich: Because...I'm sure it wasn't just my encouragement, but the fact that I

said you have the opportunity to do these things now. You're not encumbered by

other things. Do them.

Ren: Right. Did you have difficult memories when you kind of hinted a little bit

about your sophomore year?

Rich: Oh... [Chuckles] No. It's just sometimes you focus on... It's a good

learning eperience. You need to learn what's really important and all else if

you say it this way you really get to mean it, all else pales by comparison. In

other words, if you don't get the grades then nothing else matters. So it's a

process of learning how to prioritize and that was a good learning experience,

to learn how to prioritize, and I think the military helped me do that.

Reflection helped me to do that, and I'm 01:00:00not the only one who has been in that

boat. There are times where you've got to say, "Wait a minute, what's really

important here? What is the bottom-line thing that you need to pay attention to?"

Libby: And that first semester in grad school there were three of us in

particular who spent some time together, a study group, like an AP study group.

And I can remember sitting in the student center at Squires and the three of us

looking at each other going, "I can't do this. I don't know how to do this. I

thought I knew how to do this." And it was the camaraderie of our little study

group, we sort of clung together. But I also would agree with Rich, and it was

what I passed on to my students as well, it 01:01:00all depends on me. I have to find it

and I've got... I have to make certain... I've got my priorities. We've always

shared with our girls the best thing you can do for us is take care of yourself.

Ren: Right.

Libby: And I've always encouraged when I've talked to parents of my students,

I've always encouraged them to understand it's your son or daughter lying in

that bed in the dorm at 3 in the morning talking to himself, talking to herself

about I can't do this, or I can do this, because it's not your decision.

Rich: Oftentimes they have to be put to the test to find that inner strength.

Ren: Absolutely.

Rich: One of the best things I ever learned was a good sailor doesn't learn how

to sail on a calm sea. And I remember when I learned how to ski in Colorado,

after thinking I knew how to ski having learned in 01:02:00Vermont, I didn't know how to ski.

Ren: Right.

Rich: I got tested and the mountain won every time until I relaxed and said,

"Let's pay attention."

Ren: My next question is very broad obviously and it's to the both of you, but

what makes Virginia Tech so special?

Rich: Early on here it was, and I hope, since I'm not a student now I really

can't say, but early on it was the people. The people really, and the

surrounding community, the surrounding community pretty much embraced the

university, embraced... A buddy of mine and I used to like to hunt, and we would

go out and we would ask farmers and whomever if we can hunt on their land. They

would say, "Are you college boys over there?" "Oh yes sir, we are." "So you

would like to hunt on my land?" "Yes sir, we would like to, is that okay?" Now

we never killed anything. 01:03:00[Laughs] What we enjoyed I think was just being out

and having some fun. But I was always amazed at the folk in the mountains, very

plain salt of the earth folk who liked this place, and never got the sense that

there was any of this animosity toward this place, and embraced what it was

trying to do.

That would be one part of it. The other was I just never felt unwelcomed and I

felt to Libby's earlier point, if there was a real problem, in fact now that

you've mentioned it I remember going to my advisor, I'm just racking my brains

remembering his name about an issue, and again, understanding, helpful, not 01:04:00condescending, treating us as adults and trying to problem-solve. And one of the

things in our family, in fact a couple of things that have in fact I guess grown

out of all of this, one is there's more than one way to skin a cat without

getting hair in your teeth. That's kind of a saying.

And one of the things I've taught both of our daughters, we have taught both of

our daughters is if you know you have the ability, say yes and then figure it

out, and I was on the phone when I started my own consultancy, I get a phone

call one afternoon from a navy base, and there from the training officer at this

navy base, trying to accomplish these objectives. And as I talked to them I

would say, "Yes, yes, yes." I get off the phone and 01:05:00basically said, "How am I

going to do this? I have absolutely no idea how I'm going to do this, but I've

already said yes." So basically what we agreed to is I fly there. They pick up

my expenses, but I will not charge them for the day of consulting, and at the

end of that day if they want to move forward, and then I get a better sense of

what they're trying to do then we can move forward. Well that started a 4-year

engagement, and it only ended because of a change at the political level which

created... That particular president wanted to cut the budget significantly and

therefore cut out people like myself who are working in that arena. Otherwise

they would have continued...

Libby: We have always been engaged in our local Virginia Tech chapter, so with

the scholarships that we offer, Rich and I have taken our turn many 01:06:00times to

interview the students. And our first question is what made you, because they've

already been accepted at Virginia Tech when we interview them, what made you

decide on Virginia Tech. And always the first answer is, "All I had to do was

get on that campus." And the campus has... It says, its physical presence says

this is an important place. You're important too. I've taught in too many

cinderblock school buildings that do not say that same, you know, give that same

message to the young people coming in. So I think we very definitely have to 01:07:00 say

something about the physical presence of this campus, and for the drillfield to

provide such a... It's almost like everything else or the arteries out from the

heart, and then everybody cycles through and finds out what the heart of this

university is.

Ren: Yeah. I love that. Very neat.

Rich: When we were here there were no sidewalks across the drillfield. There

were no lights out on the drillfield. It is a different place, but the heart and

soul I think are still here.

Libby: The excitement is there.

Rich: But I mean one of the pictures I have on my office wall is that picture of

everyone with candlelight and I]--

Ren: Okay. Yeah.

Rich: That was a tough time.

Ren: Yeah, it was. It was 01:08:00really tough.

Libby: And the students stood up to the world and said, "This is who we are, not

who you think we are."

Rich: Media tried and tried and tried to meet them and they didn't take it. I

admire them for that.

Ren: That was such a... And that came out in a lot of these interviews that we

do, is what an important time that was to really show the world what we all

believe and know who Virginia Tech is and the soul of Virginia Tech and the

heart of Virginia Tech that was founded I think when you all were students here.

Because I've interviewed so many people and it really started in the 60s and the

70s with Marshall Hahn and that decision. And this is written about and talked

about a lot, but I think what that...

Rich: But it wouldn't have existed without that foundation before Marshall Hahn.

Ren: Exactly.

Rich: The two go like this.

Ren: Right. Absolutely.

Libby: But then you look 01:09:00at Paul Torgersen's leadership and I taught his

daughter, Karen. And in fact, we saw Karen and her husband back this fall,

[01:10:42] Chapter Officers weekend, okay. Jim McComas.

Rich: McComas was phenomenal.

Libby: Oh my goodness.

Rich: I mean he was just a phenomenal guy. If he met you once, basically he

would remember you.

Ren: Right.

Libby: And he took on...

Rich: And he knew many of the names.

Libby: But he would take on so many students each year as they came in as

freshman, but to see him walking the campus with his golden retriever I think...

It was home. It was home for him.

Rich: And when they brought back the president to the Grove, instead of being

off campus where [01:11:25] President Lavery was, that made a statement. And I

didn't like it at all when they moved the 01:10:00president off campus. I understand why

they did it, but I didn't like it, because it sent too many other wrong

messages, at least in my mind. That's my opinion. But to bring them back on

campus, because that means I can escape all this. I can go up there and it's not

important. I understand it's a small building, but it makes a statement. And you

spend the money and you retrofit it. You do what you need to do to make it

livable and make it up to code and all of that stuff.

Ren: So why do you think Virginia Tech alumni become so engaged?

Rich: I don't know. It's a great question, but I don't know.

Libby: I think the answer is in, because I looked through the material or I read

Dr. Sands' letter that he sent out by email, and to know that 42% of us are

engaged when the national average is 18, I 01:11:00think... You know it's always, you

get back what you put in, and Virginia Tech is a place that encourages...our

giving, our being involved.

Rich: Ut prosim.

Libby: Now I know Ut prosim, but mottos can be just words so many times. Where I

think... A current example that really comes back to me is last March we brought

our 15-year-old twin grandchildren, a girl and boy. They are sophomores in high

school now, but we took them, brought them here just so that they could see

Virginia Tech on a regular day, not game day, because then it's just come in to

the tailgate, go to the 01:12:00game and leave. It's not really get to see the campus.

And we went to the new engineering building, and our grandson was just in awe of

that airplane engine. But what impressed him more was the chance to talk to a

female student who was coming in to use the student-made 3D printer to run her

dining card through to print off the project that she had done for class. And

you know as we left he said, "You mean I could do that?" So it's those little encounters...

Rich: Give him the opportunity to try and fail. In fact, one of the things I

have had... I've talked to a couple of groups. I've talked to my fraternity on

more than one occasion. I've talked to freshmen in my former 01:13:00company, and one of

the things I'll say to them is finish this sentence for me. If it's worth doing

it's worth doing poorly. Let me explain. If it's worth doing it's worth doing at

the risk of doing poorly. And interestingly enough I was watching, was it Elon Musk?

Ren: Yeah.

Rich: And he said almost exactly the same thing and I went, "Wonder where you

got that?" I never met the guy. [Laughs] But yet I'm going yes -- why? Because

if it's worth doing and if it's worth doing well, how many people will stop and

never try? First lesson, the second lesson, what you learn by saying if it's

worth doing it's worth doing at the risk of doing poorly. I'll take the risk.

I'll do it. Okay. But if you 01:14:00say -- if you're tensed and you're afraid and

you're concerned, how many people will stop at that? So that's the message

[01:16:14]. Stop if it's not worth doing well, but take a risk.

Ren: We talked a little bit about this and we're kind of wrapping things up,

some changes that you've seen throughout the years and maybe some changes you

would like to see for the future. Obviously we're out of time with the new

provost, the president, soon to be a new football coach.

Rich: Everybody we know is leaving. [Laughs]

Ren: What have you seen and where you would like to see the future of this

wonderful place?

Rich: Obviously I knew [01:16:52...commandant]. I've met Tim Sands and Laura a

couple of times. They obviously wouldn't remember me, but I've certainly had the

opportunity to spend a little bit of time with them, both in their home...

Actually twice I think in their home, and then at various ut 01:15:00prosim or

whatever...things. I'm sure they will be there Friday night for the Gateway

Society. I was concerned initially when Dr. Sands came in being with his

Berkeley background, but when he talked about the mission of the land grant

university I said I think he gets it. I think he understands it. Yet, I also

know, if I get too digressed you bring me back.

Ren: That's okay.

Rich: The notion of when I was on the Alumni Board there was one year that the

State of Virginia cut the budget significantly. If my memory serves me

correctly, equivalent to what the amount of money that was in the community

college system.

And yet, private financing made up a bunch of that, and private financing,

private 01:16:00money makes up a bunch of what really runs this university. And one side

of me says well are we truly a land grant university if in fact private money is

sustaining what we are about. The other side of that is research and [01:18:26]

the necessity to become a research institution and foster that side of us, so

it's all of those questions how does that get balanced out would be. So, going

forward, I think we're doing the right things. I would like to be, I will

digress a bit, all of it makes up the whole. One piece obviously is athletics;

we're in the throes of making a major decision now. We have a great new athletic

director. I've had the opportunity to meet him a couple of times, and he's I

think 01:17:00doing very very good stuff. I have some suggestions I would like to make

to him, but that's neither here nor there, but I think he really is doing some

good things. I think our new president is, but my wife and I are... I was a

chapter president back in the 90s.

Libby: 80s.

Rich: In the 80s, and then I got on the alumni board, so I watched this

transition take place. And I would say at the time you have ideas about what can

be approved and then you kind of forget them because other things come along and

they lose the focus. They become less important because of other things that

become more important. I think we have to be, we have to search for what's the

next thing before we know what the next thing is.

That's strategy, and that's what are we about, and take our basic foundational 01:18:00principles and then say okay, let's really put a wedge in here and let's open

this up and let's see what more is there that we really haven't even considered

yet. And oftentimes, I used to put together teams of people, what I had to work

on, when I was asked as a consultant to work entirely with a particular issue,

and always I would bring in at least one person who knew absolutely nothing

about what we were doing. And they would always come up with something unique,

but they weren't encumbered with all of the knowledge, okay.

So I'm saying, perhaps one of the things we do is bring in someone who has some

basic understanding, an alumni or someone and put them in that situation and ask

them what would they do. Now that they've been brought up to speed with what

everybody might think. Just a thought. 01:19:00Libby: What I've been so pleased to see because at one point women in the Corps

was a real issue. And our first emerging scholarship winner is a young woman.

She was the middle child of three children in her family out of Annapolis,

Maryland. She thought she would go to the Naval Academy. Came here on one of

these exploratory weekends or whatever and just, she had always thought she

would go to the Naval Academy and found what the Corps offered was just what she

wanted. And to know how that issue was a non-issue for Virginia Tech's 01:20:00Corps I

think has just been marvelous. The E-Company commander coming tonight is a young

woman so articulate and so energetic and so forward thinking. So I think that's

what we're doing really well, for a young person to have both the military

training in a civilian population to see... The week I spent at the North

Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching I was there for the session

titled [01:22:45] Military Mind. Now that was my eighth choice but it was

marvelous, with both of us the son and daughter of military officers.

And we went back to Herodotus and read 01:21:00military-centered pieces of literature of

all kinds, but history. We had the dean of the History Department from Chapel

Hill on that panel. But what we came to understand was that struggle between the

civilian and the military and that's still an issue today. And for these young

people who are committing to the leadership training that the Corps offers, and

to have that interaction with a civilian mind that doesn't go that direction at

all. I mean we are training leaders for the next...

Rich: I'll tell you a quick story. Several years ago, a contingent of our cadets

went off to Texas A&M and they had 01:22:00just, not just but certainly quite a few

years after we had women come into our Corps, and one of the individuals who

went with this group of folk to A&M was a young woman, and I believe she was a

battalion commander, but I'm not certain. She was asked to bring their, I assume

they call theirs a regiment, I'm not certain about that, but bring their Corps

of Cadets to order, so she gave the order and there was this pause. And a couple

of looks I have been told were made to the various commanders and then they

responded and brought them to order. She interacted with all those cadets for

the weekend that she was there. When she got back she was asked, "Well what do

you see is the difference between Texas A&M and Virginia Tech's Corps of

Cadets?" After a brief moment she said, "Well sir, at Texas A&M they graduate

Aggies. At Virginia Tech we graduate leaders."

Ren: 01:23:00[Laughs] Good answer.

Rich: I think it nailed it. [Laughs]

Ren: I've got to ask is this a wedding picture?

Rich: It is actually. This was given to me by a fraternity brother, Leon Haroling.

Libby: September 4th.

Rich: On September 4th of this year, our 50th wedding anniversary.

Ren: Congratulations.

Rich: And there's a story, because this individual, a fraternity brother, has

done my taxes for 49 years. He's a CPA who lives in Roanoke. I've known him

obviously since we were in school. He lost his wife going on four years ago

after a very long and very tough struggle. During that process there was a woman

he knew, or I don't know exactly that relationship or how they got to know each

other, but I believe they already knew each other. I think it was from church.

She came in to help with his wife, with Mary Ellen, 01:24:00so got to know him and got

to know them. She had a younger sister who she had been caring for all of her

life so she had never married. So, and she was there through Mary Ellen's final

days and through her death and through the comforting her husband. So when Leon,

fast-forward going on three years now, he calls Jean into his office.

Libby: No, not three years ago.

Rich: Going on three years, plus three years since Mary Ellen passed away.

Libby: Passed away, yes.

Rich: About three or four months ago he calls Jean into his office and he

actually says, and you've got to know the guy, 01:25:00"Rich, Libby..." and so he says,

"Jean come into my office please." [Chuckles] So she later said, "I thought he

was going to fire me." So he comes in and he pulls out this box and he hands the

box to her and he says, "Well this will either be the most expensive friendship

ring you've ever received or I would like you to be my wife. In any case,

regardless of what you say it's yours to keep." And she said, "It took me four

days to say yes." So he calls, this was three months ago or so, he calls me

about 10 o'clock at night. Libby answers the phone and, "Who is this?" [Chuckles]

Libby: That late at night it's one of the girls, either daughter going, "Mom."

Rich: And he said, "Well it's Leon. Is Rich 01:26:00there?" I get on the phone. He says,

"This is Leon. I've got some great news." And I'm thinking well my taxes are

already finished. We've already done all those stuff because my dad had passed

away and he helped with that and prepared all that, so I don't understand what

great... He says, "I've asked Jean to marry me." I went, "That is fantastic."

He's older than I am. So I said, "We're coming up here for the Chapter Officers

Forum, but we're actually going to come up here a couple of days early and we're

going to stay at the Inn at Virginia Tech that entire weekend, even though we

had this place, we're going to stay there and we want you and Jean to come have

dinner with us." And this is what he gave us for our anniversary.

Ren: Oh, that's awesome.

Female: It's a great gift.

Libby: And they will marry January 2nd, so we'll be back up here.

Rich: So we'll be back up here.

Libby: And one of the great things about the Inn, even though Rich made those

arrangements back in January and we had no idea this was going to work out, it

was a good thing because we had a bridge table and chairs and were sleeping 01:27:00 on

aero beds. And I said, "I can't believe here we are on our 50th and we're

starting housekeeping all over again." [Laughs] So, a lifelong learner -- yes,

we're still learning.

Ren: Absolutely. So lastly, your class ring I see that you wear, do you want to

talk about that a little bit?

Rich: Sure. Absolutely.

Libby: We were the married couple at Radford College that all the girls put Mr.

and Mrs. Carpenter down, because we had to sign out in those days. So we were

the chaperones for Ring Dance.

Rich: For a lot of people.

Libby: For a lot of people.

Rich: There's some things hidden in this ring that people don't know. There's

the confederate flag on there. There's also a Confederate flag on 68's ring, but

now it's... I understand it. I don't necessarily agree totally, but I understand it.

Ren: So this is the 01:28:00same ring from when you actually graduated?

Rich: Oh yeah. This is the same one.

Ren: Very nice.

Rich: It had to be resized, but it is the same ring. If you look very closely

you will see my company right there.

Ren: Oh yeah, I see that. Mine's like to here now.

Rich: I just had that resized. That's where I born, because I had no other idea

what to put inside my ring so it says Bowling Green, Kentucky in there.

Ren: Kind of the last question, was there anything that maybe you want to talk

about or I didn't ask you or do you have anything else?

Rich: You had written down a couple of things, but we were like what would we

talk about?

Ren: Okay. Because what's so great about this project is 100 years from now your

children or grandchildren and so on and so forth can go to Newman Library and

pull up the VT Stories collection and listen to what their grandparents and

great-grandparents had to say about this University.

Rich: It's interesting. I have a cousin in 01:29:00California who started the genealogy

search, and I have another cousin in Texas who started it on the other side, on

my mother's side of the family. And as that has unfolded and more and more has

come into play it's funny the names around like Cheatham, Cheatham Hall, that's

one of my family names.

Libby: All right, we started taking notes while he's driving up here. Well, you

haven't told him a thing about being the first [bell captain] at Donaldson Brown.

Rich: When Donaldson Brown really transitioned from, it was apartments or rooms

for graduate students I believe is what it is, originally, way way back in the

day, there was a reflecting pool out in front and it was then made into the

first on-campus 01:30:00hotel. And another guy who was a Delta Sig with me and in the

Corps with me, we were both in graduate school together, we hadn't received our

GTAs at that point, so we went down and asked for a job. We were the first two

bell captains at Donaldson Brown.

We actually wrote the job description. In fact, I got him the interview. I had

already got in and I said, "Why don't you go interview?" We got the job as the

first bell captain at Donaldson Brown.

Libby: And they were here with us for the Duke game.

Ren: That's awesome.

Rich: Another thing, that reflecting pool was used frequently to throw seniors

into after the last...we were turned and turning was an experience that really

shouldn't... The way they turn cadets now is really the right way to do it. It

is perfect. But back in the day it was 01:31:00sadistic I would say.

Libby: The only thing we haven't talked about, we've had season football tickets

since grad school, since 1969, and I will credit Frank Beamer, because Dooley

drove me crazy, I love football. I have always wanted to suit up as an offensive

lineman, get in the stance, listen to the [01:34:10] creak of pads, hear the

snap of the ball, and you know hit it just one time. So of course Frank Beamer's

ladies' clinics and I've tried to get...he did four and it's been 10 years since

he's done it, wonderful times with friends and daughters to get to know more

about football. But for me as a classroom teacher to go from Monday to 01:32:00 Friday

and I can't let go of some of that emotion in the classroom, I've got to keep my

adult role but to get in the car Saturday morning, because we have never...

Rich: And grade papers all the way up.

Libby: And grade papers all the way up and then yell and scream until I'm

hoarse. I would sleep all the way back home. I don't think I would have been as

successful as I was if I hadn't had that outlet. So, you know, I just have a

real problem with young women who don't like football. And every time I taught

Beowulf I always talked about Beowulf was the quarterback, and his men, his

Comitatus were the football team, and yes, he's going to attack the weak side.

We would always get in that.

Ren: One thing I want to end on, and I should have said this earlier, but what I

find 01:33:00so interesting about your life stories is you are both military families

and you kind of moved a lot. You attended different schools. You started at a

different college but you ended up at Virginia Tech. You don't live in

Blacksburg currently, but some part of you, and correct me if I'm wrong, that

Blacksburg and Virginia Tech has almost felt like home to you.

Rich: It is home. As I said, it's the only place I... In my entire life until I

got here I never lived any place for longer than 4 years, and I lived here for

13 years.

Libby: We were here for 11.

Rich: After graduate school, I stayed here for 5 more years.

Libby: Well we moved in '76. You finished in '69 with your master's, so that was another...

Rich: Yeah, 5 years in the equities business and the insurance business and then

back on campus teaching, and training director for the Mid-Atlantic Center for

Cooperative Education and off into the big wide world. So, at one point, even 01:34:00after we were married we moved five times in 4 years, built two houses, had a

baby and stayed married.

Libby: A second baby.

Ren: That's a real testament.

Libby: But even in that we still were never far away.

Rich: So far.

Libby: So far away that we could... But we kept those tickets.

Rich: For the years we were in Southern Pines it was tough.

Libby: Yeah.

Ren: This has been wonderful. Thank you both so much. I really appreciate it.

Rich: You're welcome.