kitty
will take you home
(J=Jessi, B=Bill)
B: Oh it’s your tape-, I thought it was a camera.
J: No, it’s a tape recorder. (laughs)
B: Ok.
J: No, it’s so I can transcribe. . .
B: Sure.
J: First question. What is your full name and where did it come from?
B: Bill. That is a German name and my father came from Germany in the late twenties. My mother was also of German ancestry, but that her father (unclear) to the US. So I’m from German background.
J: K, can you tell me more about your family?
B: Yeah, mother and father I just mentioned are deceased. They in fact died together in a car accident a couple of years ago . . . (unclear) Two sisters, one deceased, um (p) at a young age from cancer. I have, I’m engaged in a second marriage and together we have five children. They are in various professional careers around the country. One in Allentown Pennsylvania area owns a life insurance company, not life insurance, an insurance firm (p) Two in Atlanta, two daughters. Um, one here in Roanoke and one is married to a minister and lives about an hour and a half north of Roanoke. And that’s our children. And we have three cats who are also our children.
J: (laughs)
B: (laughs) But they’re the only ones who live at home. And that’s my family.
J: Ok, um. . .
B: Oh! I have a wife too.
J: Yeah, I’m like, aren’t you married?
B: Yeah, I have a wife, yeah, she’s the second marriage and she’s from, um, she was born and raised in the Appomattox area west of here.
J: Um, alright, I skipped a question (laughs) I’m good at this.
B: Ok.
J: Alright, tell me what you do at Hollins and how did you come to work here?
B: Ok, I came here in answer to a blind ad in a magazine. By blind that means, of course, that (p) the job location was not identified. It was just a job offer and I was in the food management business for about seven years prior to seeing this ad. I worked for management companies, that is the company that actually ran the food services for the college (unclear) So I answered the ad and I came down here one summer day and I had never been this far south and it was quite an experience and I walked through the front there and the magnolia trees were in bloom and smelling nicely, and I thought I had entered the Gone with the Wind, um, setting. And I thought what a lovely place I’ve never been in a place like this. I was interviewed and hired that same day, (unclear) and that was almost thirty years ago. (laughs) Longer than you’ve been around.
J: Yep, yep.
B: And so I’ve had various roles over the years. I was hired originally only to be the food services director, but over the years I was asked to assume other things, this being a small campus (unclear). So I’ve done the buildings department over the years. I’ve done the summer programming, I still am involved in the summer programming. Um, I coordinate contracts with vendors that we have here, like the vending machines, the washers and dryers and the book store is contracted. So I, uh, I negotiate and administrate those contracts. (p) uh, snack-bar falls under my responsibility. (p) There’s been other smaller things over the years that have come and gone. I’m asked to do something, I try to do it.
J: Ok, um, you said you’ve never been this far south –
B: I was born in Long Island, New York and went to Easton Pennsylvania at the age of two. Lived there until I started going off to college. And I went to college in, uh, Allentown, Pennsylvania, Muhlenberg College (unclear) and, uh, worked there for a time in that area in food management. I went to New Jersey for several years, then came here. That’s where I’m from.
J: Ok, can you tell me a little about your childhood?
B: It was a tumultuous childhood. (laughs) Oh, I don’t know, I guess it was normal, just played a lot of baseball. You know, you did simplistic things in those days, there wasn’t a lot of things other than that to do. There wasn’t certainly video games (unclear) kinds of things (unclear) available today. Just did simple fun things. Played baseball and went sleigh-riding cause there was snow on the ground all the time, unlike today. Um, I think friendships were more important then because you had to create things to do with (p) other people, you almost had to invent things. So, uh, so I think friendships seemed to be more common place then. I’m talking about larger groups of friends rather than, like today, when people have two or three friends, we used to have ten or fifteen friends because you did lots of things together. Um, that’s pretty much it. You just went to school and you played (laughs) and then you discovered other things like girls and drinking a beer, you did that too, but that was later in life. And you worked a lot in order to be able to afford to go to college. And you worked while you were in college in order to afford to stay there. I don’t think all the wealth (unclear). I feel kind of old telling you all this stuff (p) but it’s true. Things have changed very quickly. That’s what I think. I guess, you played and you went to school.
J: Ok, um, so you’ve lived in this area for. . .?
B: Thirty years, longer now than I’ve lived anywhere else, actually. I didn’t think about that, but it’s true.
J: Um, how do you spend your time outside of work?
B: (P) When the weather permits, I’m a garden type of person, in my yard mostly. My wife and I enjoy Sanibel, Florida very much. It’s a little island off the coast (unclear) of off Fort Myers Florida on the Gulf Coast. Last year went there three times, so we like that place (unclear) We travel to pretty much the same place. (P) You know, indoors kinds of things. I like sports on TV. I like my three cats. I like my grandchildren to come visit. I guess that’s what I do with my time. This, this job is very demanding, time wise. I spend a lot of time here at Hollins. (p) That’s the nature of this business.
J: (P) Um, do you remember any person, event, or experience that dramatically affected your life?
B: (P) (P) uhhh. (P) A single event you’re talking about? (P) Well, you know, I think everybody my age goes through passages in life, which you have not yourself had the opportunity to experience yet and you will. I think the (p) death of people, family members and friends (p) uh (p) I think employment is important to everybody. I think discovering Hollins was a big thing in my life. (unclear) I worked with several other colleges and universities prior to Hollins, none of them is like Hollins. The student body (unclear for several sentences)
I think, you know, life’s passages are how somebody marks their life. Marriages and births and deaths, uh, things of that nature, but that’s true of everybody I’m sure. (P) I don’t think there’s any one single event (unclear) unless you won the lottery I don’t know what it would be. Life is just a collection of events (p) (cough) I was recently ill for sometime, and I think that was a very (unclear) long time and I think I developed a (p) empathy for people who are ill all the time, that never get better (unclear) That’s, that’s probably a pretty momentous thing. I mean we all experience these ups and downs in life and some are (important) and some are not and that makes someone’s life, collectively.
J: Um, I mean, are you comfortable talking about your illness, or. . .
B: Sure, I was, you know, comfortable with that. You want to know more about that?
J: Sure.
B: (laughs) Well I left here, work here one Friday evening and went home and had dinner with my wife and got very ill, not related to what I had eaten but very severe back and stomach pains. And, um, (p) all through the evening and the next day, Saturday, I had them, and finally Saturday evening I said I think we ought to go to the emergency room. And my wife took me there and I had extremely high blood pressure, stroke range (p) so they checked me into the hospital. (unclear) said my gall bladder had to be removed and I scheduled that surgery and I couldn’t have it happen until after Christmas cause (unclear). Checked in for that and they removed the gall bladder and in doing that they had these, these wonderful tiny camera they have now-a-days, when they do surgeries, they don’t actually have to, you know, lacerate you anymore, they just drill little holes in you and but one of those little cameras in. They found this tumor in my, um, on my intestines. So, I’m sorry, that was before Christmas. So they scheduled that surgery for after Christmas so that they could remove it. So I did that surgery and it was cancerous but could not be removed, so its still there (p) (cough) uh, cause it’s growing on such a place that they can’t take it out. (p) uh (p) so, uh, I recovered from that surgery, got blood clots in my leg as a result of the surgery. Couldn’t walk, went to the hospital again for ten days (p) um, back out, almost was ready, then I got them again. Went back in again so I was in four times since October 1, and I just got back to work on Friday and met you on Monday. (laughs) wow, so that’s, um, that’s what I have, I have this little, I have this cancer on me that, um, is not life threatening, but, um, could be, just has to be controlled. That’s what I’ve got, that’s why I was in the hospital. (P) But, dealing with that is a series of, like blood clotting, you gotta maintain a (p) correct blood counts, (unclear) Coumadin, constantly testing for what level of Coumadin, (unclear) um, the cancer portion is treatment by injection to control symptoms associated with it. Um, in general I feel fine. Certainly not like all the folks I’ve met over the months that are desperately sick and will stay that way.
J: Do you feel happy to have escaped that fate?
B: There were times when I wished that every hospital staff had a Jack Kevorkian working for them, cause you really feel that bad. You hurt that much, and you kinda think in a contrast when you’re able to walk around finally in a hallway or whatever (unclear) and you look in peoples rooms and see what they’re combating, you don’t feel so bad anymore. So, um, (p) you know I feel like I’m pretty normal (unclear). (laughs) Yes indeed. I’m glad to be sitting here talking to you.
J: Can you tell me more about when you came to Hollins and were you married before?
B: Yeah, I was married. We had, let’s see, I guess we were just about to produce our third child when I moved to Hollins and uh (P) I had an interview in mid-August and went to the airport to fly home and was paged and told I was hired. That was a nice feeling. I was able to do that in the same day. And, uh, we built a house here, so I had to live here myself for a few months until the house was built. Then we (unclear) went to local schools, some went to college and then, well, that marriage ended and I married again. Married a young lady with two children and I consider them to be my children. So two of them went to college, two of them have other careers. So three out of five ain’t bad. And I said two of them live in Atlanta right now. Ironically enough, they’ve moved so many times, you know, within Atlanta, changing jobs and things, that they actually now live a half a mile from one another. They just ended up there, and that’s ironic that they (p) are.
J: Anything else you want to share about family, childhood?
B: Nah, I think family I pretty much defined, and um, I think that your mom and dad are proud of what you’ve accomplished to this point and will accomplish in your life, and certainly proud of what mine have done. One daughter who constantly meets people like, uh, mayor Guiliani, just because of the position she’s in. That’s a source of pride, you know, (unclear) one very successful.
Great kids, nice wife, in phase two of your life I think that’s what you hope for, you know, you hope for (unclear) of you did or didn’t do in life and through your children you, you don’t accomplish it, but you see it. So I’m sure your mom and dad are, fondly hope that you do things that make them, you know, real proud of you at some point, and then. . . But I think that’s what life evolves in, evolves in the next phase of your family. Phases actually, (unclear) grandchildren. That’s another phase. They’re not as productive or anything (unclear).
My wife, I’ve been married to now for twenty years, I guess, second wife. She’s very ambitious, and her, my step-daughters who I consider my daughters because they were babies when I met them and their father wasn’t present. Uh, they reflect what she is. (unclear) spunkiness. She graduated from Hollins by the way. She graduated in 1991 in the adult program and she immediately went to Virginia Tech and got her masters in a year. She’s very ambitious and very smart, and works two jobs. (laughs) So anyway, she inspires her daughters to be what they are (p) and, uh, inspires me too because she has limitless energy. She’s younger than me, so she keeps me moving along. (laughs) My wife at one time, prior to graduating from Hollins was the administrative assistant to the president at Hollins, this is when I met her. She started out development office, as an assistant, then she went to the admissions office, left to go to work for a law firm, and we got a new president, Dr. Browning came to us and they were looking for a, uh, somebody needed to be her assistant cause she was new (unclear) some fresh faces around. So it was suggested to my wife that she apply for the job, and she did, and so she was Dr. Browning’s assistant for (p) well I guess three years something like that, and she decided to go full time college and she graduated from Hollins. I’m proud to say that she did it, hum. She had a great time. She met a lot of people of our age. And we used to have them to our house (unclear). She didn’t like people her own age, she liked traditional aged students. (laughs) But that’s my family I guess, as it exists right now. (long pause) Where are you from by the way?
J: I’m from Lynchburg Virginia.
B: Ah, so you know Appomattox.
J: Oh, yeah
B: How about Spout Spring? You ever hear of that?
J: No actually
B: It’s just (p) see what is the route that goes into Appomattox? Is it still 460, I guess, isn’t it? It’s just before you get into Appomattox. It’s a little tiny (unclear for several sentences)
J: Yeah, I applied to Sweet Briar
B: Yeah?
J: I like Hollins better.
B: Sweet Briar’s very nice, I don’t think it’s quite as large as Hollins. It may not, I mean actually, neither of us are very large but (unclear) I guess about 550 (unclear) 500 maybe.
J: (P) Well, it’s been a good interview. Uh, that’s all the questions I have for now. It will probably get more involved next time.
B: I’d love to see what all this ends up in. Now, this is kind of a collective project you said of several students putting together what they’re finding?
J: Yeah. Well, it’s the whole class. There’s about fourteen of us. We each picked a person and, uh, we’re each doing that person’s life story.
B: Well maybe I’ll think of something humorous for you, for the next time we talk, something in my childhood. But there’s things form everybody’s life that they don’t share, you know what I mean?
J: Yeah.
B: You’re not going to find out everything. (laughs)
J: (laughs) (P) Let’s talk about when we can meet again for another interview.
B: Well I would just say, you know, as you feel that you have come to a point where you’ve developed some new questions or a different direction, or something, just let me know. If I’m available, we’ll sit down when you’re available. I’m here pretty much daylight hours, so just let me know when you think you’d like to talk and very shortly thereafter we will.
J: Ok, thank you very much for your time.
B: You’re welcome
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