“Thank You, Fellow Citizens”

Out To Pastoral

by John Idol

HILLSBOROUGH, NC—(Weekly Hubris)—4/5/10—As I reflect on how I came to be a college professor, I realize I owe an incalculably large debt to fellow citizens, including my parents and wife as well as faceless taxpayers across the nation. One of eight children in a carpenter/farmer household in the Blue Ridge, I early learned that if I hoped to make anything of my life, I had to hit the books and hit them hard. My dad, whose formal schooling ended with the seventh grade, and my mom, who dropped out of high school as a sophomore, wanted all of us to get good grades and, at least, a high school diploma.

Eventually, six of their coaxed, cajoled, and bragged-on scholars earned diplomas, two of them being elected to the National Honor Society. One of the dropouts fared well as a service station operator in Boone, NC; another became a much-sought-after painter/carpenter.

My older brother, Ken, worked his way through college. I might have also, except that the Korean War could well have yanked me out of school and sent me to a part of Asia I didn’t yearn to see. If I were to serve my country, I wanted my hitch in uniform to be on my own terms. That goal led me to look into which branch of the armed forces would likely offer me an opportunity to learn about the wondrous ways of electricity and electronics. A boyhood dream of blasting off into “the wild, blue yonder” made the Air Force recruiter’s job easy—one week after I finished high school.

Of my four-year Air Force hitch, I spent roughly half in radar school. During most of that time, I figured I’d have a leg up on fellow electrical engineering schools at North Carolina State or Georgia Tech, colleges I hoped to enter once I’d doffed my uniform. Had a teaching position been open at Keesler Air Force Base, I probably would have stayed in uniform and enjoyed a military career but, finding myself a repairman of malfunctioning radar sets, I balked at becoming a servant to a machine, no matter how wondrous. I needed something involving people and not electrons or grids, I discovered, lest I be shunted off from what Hawthorne called “the magnetic chain of humanity.” To describe my situation in modern jargon, I was a “people-person.” My high school aptitude had told me as much, but the prospect of greater wealth as an engineer brought me to a path I now had misgivings about taking. I yearned to become a newspaperman, envisioning myself as a future columnist or editorial writer. That aspiration sprang from my writing for the high school newspaper.

Honorably discharged at West Palm Beach Air Force Base, I wasted no time heading home to enter summer school classes at Appalachian State Teachers College (now Appalachian State University). Marriage was to follow within a few months of enrollment. My wife’s salary and expert typing skills (put to great use on term-papers) and the GI Bill covered most of my expenses, though I did some clerking in a department store and some house painting to augment my income. The bulk of funds came, however, from fellow citizens through the GI Bill. A double major in English and history as well as a year’s stint as editor of the college newspaper should have put me on track for a career in journalism. Before I could complete requirements for a degree at Appalachian State, though, I had a summer session of student teaching to do.

An advanced class for high school students in American Literature pulled me right off the journalism track. Teaching was so rewarding, so challenging, so fulfilling, so free of producing “literature in a hurry” (as one New York journalist once described the harried lives of newspapermen), that I set my goal to become a college teacher. I simply wanted to enjoy great literature with students actively engaged in reading it. .

Since I’d packed my studies together tightly in order to graduate in three years, I hadn’t taken time to apply to graduate schools. If I were to be a teacher, why not spend a full year in the classroom, I thought. That led me to take a job in Blowing Rock, NC, teaching a combination seventh-and-eighth grade class . . . and senior English, when the younger students had their PE period. For the combined group, I taught every subject, even beginning algebra! Meanwhile, I busily mailed out applications for graduate school. It was not that I didn’t enjoy working with youngsters, I truly did, but the world’s greatest literature played but a minor role in the secondary school curriculum.

After considering teaching assistantships, I found my decision made for me when the University of Arkansas extended the offer of a fellowship. Thanks to Russia’s launching of Sputnik and Congressional action to bring American science and engineering up to a competing level with the Soviets, the University of Arkansas had National Defense Education Act (NDEA) fellowships to offer. In an act of wisdom and generosity, Congress included the humanities in the legislation.

The NDEA put me on the fast track to a doctorate. Pointing out the need to show college-level experience on my résumé, the chair of the English Department sweetened the pot for me by adding a teaching assistantship in the third year of my studies. Thus, I was drawing on two sources of public funding for my degree. With an income from a working wife—employed  in the U of A purchasing office—her salary derived from taxes paid by fellow citizens, I nest-egged some money, a rare feat for a graduate student.

Setting aside some income from Converse College (for summer school classes) and Duke University (for its program for retirees), modest royalties for books I’ve published, and pay for grading done for Educational Testing Service, all my earnings came from public sources in South Carolina. As well, my benefits for retirement and insurance touched the pockets of Sandlappers.

Do I feel guilty about practically a lifetime of living off my fellow citizens? No, indeed, for I rendered what was deemed distinguished service and I have many times over in income taxes, state and federal, returned with handsome interest every dollar invested in my education. With my wife, I have funded scholarships, contributed to the building of community and collegiate libraries, and established a grant to promote research and creative activities. Thanks to my fellow citizens, I can afford to do all this.

Indeed, I am most grateful.