2008 Woodie Awards
Hendrix Fossil Unearths Memories
Dr. David Larson
Issue date: 1/27/06 Section: Editorial
I guess it is now official: the invitation to write this article confirms that I have become a living fossil, a kind of faculty coelacanth wrenched from the depths to tell all about what it used to be like "back when." "Back when" is the late 1970s, when I was a young, fresh, eager, and very junior faculty member.
It was the Golden Age of Hendrix. The Great faculty members were at their peak of brilliance, the college brimmed both with Arkansas money and hyper-bright Arkansas students. The students were respectful, diligent, and without exception teetotalers…well, possibly my fossilized memory isn't as clear as it should be. Anyone who has seen the Troubadour photo of young Tim Maxwell sunning himself atop the Martin porch will know what I mean.
In all seriousness, a lot of things have changed, both for young faculty and for Conway residents. New faculty nowadays get to teach in their area of specialty from the get-go, they receive princely stipends, and they are treated humanely with a small course reduction during their first year. And, Conway residents live in a bustling and modern city of 52,000, where one can legally have wine with a meal.
Three decades ago, on the other hand, young Assistant Professor Larson was assigned eight courses during his first year. As if that wasn't heavy enough, he had not had any course work whatsoever, graduate or undergraduate, in three of those courses. He learned officially about this "challenging" assignment from the dean. Christie, Dr. Marion Francis Christie, was a Hendrix alumnus, who at the beginning of his freshman year had been assigned a room in Galloway Hall.
Dean Christie was a fine and fair man who had the disconcerting habit of breaking out into a full but brief smile when he made a point, even though he may have been discussing Jean Calvin's philosophy. At my official first interview we chatted about ice-breaking topics like Job. "Well, then, do you think that Job deserved his treatment?" (smile)[I hadn't read so much as one word of the Book of Job]. Then he went on to Camus' The Stranger "Cheery book isn't it?" (grin) [I had read The Stranger, but hadn't understood anything about it].
It was the Golden Age of Hendrix. The Great faculty members were at their peak of brilliance, the college brimmed both with Arkansas money and hyper-bright Arkansas students. The students were respectful, diligent, and without exception teetotalers…well, possibly my fossilized memory isn't as clear as it should be. Anyone who has seen the Troubadour photo of young Tim Maxwell sunning himself atop the Martin porch will know what I mean.
In all seriousness, a lot of things have changed, both for young faculty and for Conway residents. New faculty nowadays get to teach in their area of specialty from the get-go, they receive princely stipends, and they are treated humanely with a small course reduction during their first year. And, Conway residents live in a bustling and modern city of 52,000, where one can legally have wine with a meal.
Three decades ago, on the other hand, young Assistant Professor Larson was assigned eight courses during his first year. As if that wasn't heavy enough, he had not had any course work whatsoever, graduate or undergraduate, in three of those courses. He learned officially about this "challenging" assignment from the dean. Christie, Dr. Marion Francis Christie, was a Hendrix alumnus, who at the beginning of his freshman year had been assigned a room in Galloway Hall.
Dean Christie was a fine and fair man who had the disconcerting habit of breaking out into a full but brief smile when he made a point, even though he may have been discussing Jean Calvin's philosophy. At my official first interview we chatted about ice-breaking topics like Job. "Well, then, do you think that Job deserved his treatment?" (smile)[I hadn't read so much as one word of the Book of Job]. Then he went on to Camus' The Stranger "Cheery book isn't it?" (grin) [I had read The Stranger, but hadn't understood anything about it].