James Sullivan
Marist College
Poughkeepsie, New York
Transcribed by Wai Yen Oo
For the Marist College Archives and Special Collections



Transcript
– James Sullivan
Interviewee
: James Sullivan
Interviewer
: Gus Nolan
Interview

Date
: 21 October 2011
Location
: Marist College Archives and Special Collections
Topic
: Marist College History

Subject

Headings
:
James Sullivan



Marist College Alumni



Marist College – History



Marist College (Poughkeepsie, New York)



Marist College – Social Aspects

Summary:
James “Jim” Sullivan discusses his early years and his studying as an undergraduate
at Marist College. He talks about memorable events on campus and his post-graduate career. He
compares Marist College from his time and the contemporary Marist College and how it has
developed and changed over the years. Additionally, he reflects on the future of technology in
education and whether higher education will be worthwhile in the future.





00:09

GN:
Today is October 21
st
, 2011. We have an opportunity to interview Jim Sullivan, Dr.
Sullivan. You’re the class of?
00:23

JS:
1966.
00:24

GN:
’66, Good morning, Jim. How are you?
00:29

JS:
Good morning Gus. It’s fun to be back here.
00:30

GN:
It’s a delight to have you come. We're doing this interview now for the Archives and
at the end of it we will ask you to sign a paper that would allow us to use it the material gathered
for publications or whatever research is going to happen to have using these records in time to
come. Jim, can we start this way? Could you start life before Marist your early years where were
you born brought up grade school high school?
01:03

JS:
Sure I was born in 1945. My family had just three years before I moved to
Farmingdale, New York. We live there from ’45 to ‘55 move then in ’55 to a house not too far
away in Rego Park. My early school years I attended Catholic schools throughout high school I
went to St Leo's grammar school in Corona in New York. I was a five-year-old kid riding a bus,
two buses from my house to get to the Catholic grammar school. When we moved to Rego Park I
went to Resurrection Ascension Parish where the Marist brothers taught from Grade six through
eight. Had them in grade six, seven, and eight. I then went to Archbishop Malloy High School
also run by the Marist brothers. It was kind of like going to Paris Island back then back in the
50s, in the early 60s.
01:59

GN:
Were the Brothers rather strict in regulations and enforced?
02:03

JS:
Unbelievably So.
02:05

GN:
You had a Brother Victor there.
02:06

JS:
Absolutely Brother Victor used to hang out on the on the roof over the cafeteria and
would look for kids whose hair was too long. Yeah and then would rush down and literally cut it
off in the middle of the play area. It was an interesting place to be. It was a very interesting place
to be.
02:25

GN:
What years were you at Molloy?
02:27

JS:
’58 to ‘62.


02:29

GN:
’58 to ‘62. It was one of the first years then.
02:33

JS:
Yeah they opened in ’57. Yeah, they went from St Anne's to Jamaica.
02:38

GN:
Yeah, I was there for that first year and then I had come from St Ann’s Academy
which Molloy is …
02:45

JS:
Yeah there some legendary people there. Brother Ernest who taught math. Lot of
really, really good people. Some really interesting character too.
02:57

GN:
Yeah were you involved athletics in any way?
02:58

JS:
No.
02:59

GN:
Track. […]
02:59

JS:
And if you went to Molloy and you were not involved in athletics, you were kind of a
non-person it was a very much involved in athletics, basketball. I mean they sent basketball
players to the N.B.A. Baseball same thing they sent baseball players from the major leagues.
03:18

GN:
Well they had Lou Carnesecca there from St Ann’s originally. Then Jack Curran
came later and is still there.
03:23

JS:
Jack Curran is still there. I still see his name occasionally. After I graduated from
Molloy in ’62, well just before I graduated from Molloy, it was decided that I was going to go to
college. My mother and father decided that for my part. I really hadn't thought much about it at
that point I was actually thinking about maybe go into the army and again. They wanted me to go
to a Catholic college. So I applied to three or four St Bonny’s, Siena, a couple of other places.
Got accepted into Marist. Never visited the campus. Things were done very differently back
then.
04:03

GN:
Contrast to today where you see this group marching around and getting interview.
Before you leave the high school, activities. Did you work in the summer did you have hobbies
did you play ball at home?
04:16

JS:
I played a lot of sports at home. Yeah, I played a lot of football, a lot of baseball
stickball. I never played basketball. It was never sport I really was interested in. I worked when I
was in high school. I worked in a drug store over in Jackson heights for most of my high school


years even worked there for a year after I got into college. Activities at Molloy, I was involved in
a lot intermural stuff not into scholastic stuff.
04:46

GN:
School paper? Yearbook anything like that?
04:49

JS:
School paper, no, Yearbook, no. When I went to teach I wanted to get involved in that
stuff. It was kind of a tough place to be because I was working in the afternoon I got out of
school at two thirty quarter three. I had two trains to get home and then I had about a half mile
walk from the train station back to my house so staying after school was not something that a lot
of my friends that did it and certainly I didn't do it very much myself and as I said most of the
sports you were pretty much if you were involved in sports especially track, you were there
forever.
05:27

GN:
But you are well-dressed going to school.
05:30

JS:
Absolutely tie jacket absolutely. God help you if you didn't have that on.
05:36

GN:
Moving on. Why Marist? Outside of that it was Catholic, was it close enough? In
other words not too far away, did you board here?
05:43

JS:
Yeah, I boarded here. It was about ninety miles and five miles from my house. Why
Marist? I guess it had something to do with my association with Marist Brothers. Obviously, it
had something to do with that. There were so many of them I really liked and they were really
good teachers. And as I said college to me was something that I was really partially interested in.
I will be honest my first year at Marist, I didn’t really like it for a lot of reasons … most of which
was I really didn’t think I belonged here and that all changed and we can talk about that later on
but it was close. It was at that time if you want to know what I cost room, board, unlimited
tuition was 1450 dollars.
06:32

GN:
Amazing.
06:32

JS
Amazing. When my son graduated from Marist in 2000, the last check I wrote was for
27,500 and god knows what is now.
06:44

GN:
42 something but which dormitory was in construction? Was Sheahan up?
06:52

JS:
Sheehan was the first year it was up. It was my first year here. My friends who had
gone here were living in Donnelly for the most part. In fact they were living in Donnelly. I got


into Sheehan and it was… third floor was freshmen. The second floor was sophomores. The first
floor was seniors, juniors. I think it held about 120 and 130 kids.
07:16

GN:
And then Leo went up.
07:17

JS:
Leo was brand new. I got into Leo, my sophomore year and then Champagnat Hall. I
spent two years Champagnat. So I had three brand new dorms in four years. At that time Nilus
Donnelly just all over the place with his tractor, digging stuff up, putting stuff up. The guy was
amazing, he was amazing.
07:40

GN:
And there are stories about how they were decided to build them there. They were
originally going to put them out on Route Nine and they would have to go down so many feet
and Nilus and Linus, they were a combination. Linus Foy, I think was the president.
07:58

JS:
The youngest college president in America when he was named. He was twenty-seven
I think when he was named. He was brilliant, brilliant guy yeah.
08:06

GN:
He is still very active here you know.
08:07

JS:
I see his name and the alumni stuff all the time.
08:11
GN:
I see him every day. He lives in my neighborhood and we're good friends.
08:00

JS:
I had him as… He was one of the first people to really get involved with the
computers. In the fall of ’62, he taught freshmen class in computers and I thought that was just
amazing that the college president. I didn't know much about college presidents and what they
did. I found it amazing that this guy was willing to take on college, a freshman class and we were
not Math people and it was made very clear. He made it very clear that he knew we were not
math people. We were here to satisfy the one-year math requirement but he was terrific. he's a
great guy. Just absolutely approachable.
08:54

GN:
Very democratic.
08:57

JS:
Fair and you just, he never … He was so brilliant but he was so down to earth.
09:03

GN:
What raises me to say that is some of the decisions like putting up the dormitory…
Nilus says to Linus, “Why don't we just put it up on the hill? Where there is rocks already?” And
he said, “Alright, you know we'll put it up there.” At that time too there might have been still be
a stone wall around the place out front and it was beginning to crumble. And again, Nilus, you


mentioned the bulldozer and Nilus says, “You know should we try and fix it or take it down?”
No committee meetings, no conferences, no decisions. Take it down. It had been put up to kind
of protect the Marist brothers who were here from the outside world. And then that has all
changed radically. We want everybody to know we’re here. So they've taken it down and to this
day. Well it's been replaced by an iron fence you can see through. I mean it's hard to get… I
wouldn't say it's hard to get in here but they try to channel how students will come in rather than
just crossing Route Nine which is another story about the dormitories. Well the first you didn't
go so well but you came back, you seem to get is a little taste for Marist.
10:25

JS:
Yeah I fell in love with Marist and toward the end of my freshman year, I fell in love
with it I think I probably told you I spent most of my first year. Over at Max or Franks’, the bar.
As did a lot of other kids.
10:39

GN:
Or the Derby. Brown Derby was downtown.
10:14

JS:
Happy Jacks. All those places and it wasn't because I was away from my folks. It was
just I just hadn't fallen in love with college and I guess for first semester my grades really
showed it. I think I got my first index was like a two-two-five and I think my second one was a
little bit lower than that. But then I ran into some really great profs and I got involved in the
theater guild and guys like Jim Britt and Joe Belanger who I just had enormous admiration for
and got involved in a play the end of my freshman year in the spring and fell in love with that. I
really enjoyed that and I turned things around and I ran in to some profs who were terrific.
George Sommer and just so many other. So sophomore year. My college year really was
sophomore, junior, and senior. That’s when I was actually a student and actually got decent
grades.
11:36

GN:
Did you ever have a history teacher Cashin?
11:40

JS:
Eddy Cashin. No, I didn’t. I'm sorry I did, He taught a course that we used to call the
Cowboys and Indians. It was about the American West. Yeah. I had Eddy Cashin. Gee, he was
another really good guy, really good guy, a smart guy.
11:59

GN:
Funny guy. Interesting stories.
12:02

JS:
I had him for one semester for cowboys and Indians.



12:04

GN:
This is a bullet that just missed, you know. Well how do you know? It didn't hit him.
So… that the teachers and how about the camaraderie and friends? There were no women, yet
right? On campus at least.
12:24

JS:
No, we had St Francis’ Nursing School. That was the place. And Dutchess Community
College, that's where we would get our actresses from in town. But one of the great things about
this place and I didn't appreciate it in my first year and I came to love it in my sophomore, junior,
and senior was that everybody knew everybody. You couldn't walk down any part of the campus
without running into people that not only you knew but you knew well. When I came here, my
freshman class graduated I think 176 kids. At most in my senior year we had Sheahan was 120,
Leo was 300 maybe, Champagnat maybe 500. We had, I think, under 1000 kids on campus.
13:13

GN:
Well they were going to stop a twelve hundred at one time, capping it. And then they
moved it up to fifteen hundred you know because the more the dormitories went up you know
the more then it became attraction for the New York population. And so that the first year or two
they didn't think that they would have to do that, that they thought they could draw from the
Hudson Valley but Linus was the one who figured it out is that there's not enough student
population in this area. We had to put up dormitories and then he was able to swing the deal with
getting the government to pay for them. State bonded funding for the dormitories. We just had to
pay the interest on it and so we are providing a place for the kids to come to. So that whole cycle
developed.
14:07

JS:
The other thing and I don't think it exists and in most other places and maybe it's very
different here now I don't know. Not only did everybody know everybody. But the faculty knew
you and you knew the faculty even if you didn't have them in class they knew who you were, in
Donnelly hall was the cafeteria and most of the faculty…
14:30

GN:
The offices of the facility right around the circle.
14:32

JS:
And they would come into, they would have their dinner there. And they’d coffee and
it was not unusual to sit down at a table and have a couple of professors come in and sit down
and talk with you. That was a really unique thing about the place they knew you and when
people know you can't really screw around too much because it gets out. It gets out very quickly.
I remember Joe Belanger saying somebody said we were in rehearsal, my freshman year. And
somebody said to Jim was doing a nice job on that part or Jim did something nice I don't what it



was. And Joe said, “It was told to me.” Joe said, “Yeah it's a shame he's going to flunk out.” And
that got back to me and that hurt because it suddenly dawned on me that yeah maybe if I don't
start getting back on track, I'm going to. And they took a genuine interest in you. They really did.
15:32

GN:
And he was a straight arrow. Joe would tell you you're an absolute disaster.
15:38

JS:
He is a good guy, they were all they were all, the faculty here. I can honestly say I
never had a bad prof in four years. I'm not sure any other people can say that. People here with
legendary reputation is D.A. Drennan. He scared the heck out of people. He was tough. I loved
the guy. I love… I took him three times in one year. I loved him I thought he was great. witty
smart. unbelievably smart. He would give tests that were just unbelievable.
16:21

GN:
I was a proctor here in the dormitory one time. Well, it would be ‘69 I guess it was
and there was a book-burning ceremony at the last day. Kids burning his book. Some didn't like
him.
16:35

JS:
He had a black metaphysics book.
16:37

GN:
They were not particularly pleased. Roscoe Balch, did you ever have him?
16:43

JS:
I had him freshman year. Roscoe Balch.
16:46

GN:
Another legend.
16:47
JS:
He was a good guy. Good teacher. He knew his stuff. He knew his stuff and one of the
interesting thing was back in those days, cuts were monitored pretty cool pretty closely but
Roscoe for whatever reason never really took attendance on a regular basis and that word got out
pretty quickly. And it was a morning class I know that. It was like an eight o'clock eight thirty
class and we were over in Donnelly and there's a rear door entrance to the class. There was a
front door entries and a rear door entrance to the class and people would bail out as soon as they
saw that he didn't have his book, his mark book with him. They would bail out. I mean we… like
it was like middle school kids, it really was. He came in one day and he had the book here,
tucked in his jacket and kids bailed out and he goes “Aha!” and pulls the book out.
17:42

GN:
Moving on what did you study will you were here.
17:45

JS:
I started out majoring in history. Ran into George Sommer, my sophomore year and
said I want to teach English cause I thought he was terrific. So I changed my major in the first
semester of sophomore year in English.
- - - -


18:01

GN:
Did you do Old English with him?
18:02

JS:
Yep. Yeah. I took him for every course that he taught. Everything that he taught I took
I took a course and knows those are the days you could do that kind of stuff. They weren't all that
many English teachers back then.
18:15

GN:
There weren’t. No I forget what kind of system it had. We had a time when it was
sixty-sixty core program. In other words you had a choice for sixty credits, you chose what you
wanted and the department decided that the other sixty like you had to take English literature,
American literature or writing course, a speech course, Bob Norman?
18:39

JS:
Yeah sure I had him freshman year for composition.
18:43

GN:
For composition. Alright so we've seen… you're growing and liking for it and
moving it just one thing more and any particular assignments or involvements that you had? You
mentioned the theater but for George Sommer, a paper that got you particularly interested in a
phase of literature?
19:12

JS:
George Sommer was famous for signing these ten, fifteen-page papers, research
papers you know way back in the day before Google and before anything even remotely
resembling a computer existed.
19:23

GN:
Technically […]
19:25

JS:
And he graded those with a fine-tooth comb but he was a great showman. He really
knew how to put on a show and he knew his stuff. But he made it so interesting and he made it
so dramatic. He would feign indignation at something or he would feign anger with something
and I just stick to sit back there and just sat amazed with him because I thought he was not only a
good prof, a good teacher and a good guy. And demanding. But he was fun. He was fun to be in
the class with. When you took him for it's like I had him for four courses one year I mean you
can't do that without getting to know people on a real level. I remember one time we were in
George and I and his wife Ann were over in Max with a couple of other people and we were
sitting down having a good time, having a couple beers, and just talking. Again that was one of
the amazing things about this place. You can't do in most campuses and I said “Dr. Sommer, I
will get you one more beer.” Anne yells, “If you get him one more beer Jim I’m going to have
him fail you.” (laughter) As far as getting involved with I’m not sure I understand the question


about the papers. I will say that everything about this place, I loved. Every single thing. There's
not one negative thing I can say about this place or the teaching staff. And the people who went
here are friends, my best friends to this day.
21:11

GN:
Is that … I was going to ask that now? Did those relationships continue that you
developed here? Some of them…
21:16

JS:
There were two guys who were older than I am one year older and they graduated in
’65. Bobby Hackett, Dennis Finney they're my best friends.
21:23

GN:
Denis F was in the theater stuff, big guy in the theater.
21:25

JS:
Right that’s where I met Dennis. That was in 1962 and you know we've been. We see
each other five times a week our wives are best friends. Bobby, I see a couple times a month. We
play golf. We go out to dinner.
21:45

GN:
What is Denis doing now?
21:46

JS:
Dennis retired. He was an English teacher in a couple school districts on Long Island.
He got access the few times, finished up in Huntington, retired the same year I did, 2006. And
now he visits his kids in Chicago and Massachusetts.
22:06

GN:
Did you know Tom Moran?
22:09

JS:
Tom Moran? No.
22:12

GN:
Well he was another George Sommer associate as it were. In fact he came… I think
we didn't even have Leo yet. There used to be dormitories in Donnelly and he's […] sequence
and then he stayed with George after he graduated. He taught at Lourdes for a year. And he went
on to graduate school. In that early years, he’s one of those fellows that talking about George
Sommer was so friendly with him. Ann asked me, “Where is he now actually lives in Park
Avenue? He did very well for […]
22:52

JS:
I guess so. Donnelly was the place where they had four people rooming together.

22:56

GN:
That's right and they had the famous Murphy beds. They come out of the wall and put
them back up you know and they could be a study hall during the day etc.



23:07

JS:
There was a time back in, I remember in January of ’63, the end of my first semester
here. It was like a typhoon had come through the kids in the buildings. People came back in
January and found three quarters of their roommates had failed out. It was like a bloodbath. You
walked in your room and you find your roommate is no longer here. It was really … It was
bizarre. A lot of kids failed out in January.
23:40

GN:
In January because generally they don't push it that hard till June.
23:43

JS:
They did and way back then if you fail the class back then. Not only did you get zero
quality points. You lost quality points. It was like a minus. They did away with that rather
quickly I think after my freshman year. But there were a lot of kids that failed out my freshmen
year. A lot of kids.
24:04

GN:
You like everything. What was the hardest thing for you in college? Like the routine
early classes…?
24:11

JS:
No. Once I got into sophomore year I found everything really pretty easy. I learned
how to study. I became a student so that made life a lot easier. I was pretty responsible. The
hardest thing about this place was graduation day. I really didn't want to leave. I wanted to stay
here.
24:35

GN:
Well is there a sidebar to that? Was the war on? Was Vietnam?
24:37

JS:
The war was on. They hadn't really ratcheted up yet. That was coming in ’67 and ’68.
There was some mild protest about it here but almost nothing during my years here. And
similarly drugs were non-existent here when I was here. Utterly nonexistent I mean the word you
never even heard the word and people drank a lot.
25:07

GN:
That was the drug, alcohol.
25:08

JS:
That was the drug. There was no such thing as that here. And I thought that was and
how quickly that changed in the next couple years.
25:17

GN:
Once the war came big time, Jack Eberth is a name … you don't remember?
25:23

JS:
Jack Eberth? No. Was he a student?
25:26

GN:
Yeah, he was a student from Long Island and got drafted while here, while in senior
year. Even though it was not to be. It happened and they said, “You can adjudicate this but you



have to come and you know go through it and we’ll but once we call you, you’re called.” They
don't make a mistake so you got to go through the routine. He works here now for us he was
telling me this story about how he got called and again the kind of the spirit of Marist because he
was in senior year and in good standing, they send him a diploma. They let him finish in
absentia. You know that made all the difference when he got out of service. They went into
I.B.M and did very well.
26:18

JS:
The war was an interesting thing because it's so much dependent upon where you
lived. I lived in a very big draft board in Jamaica, in Queens when I was 1A and I was 1A for a
long time. I never got called. I never got called. Then I got deferment because I became a
teacher. That elapsed and then they went to the birthday lottery and I pulled a really high number
there.
26:43

GN:
Tell me about the theater. Best shows you're in. Best remembrances at least?
26:50

JS:
Great memories about that, I guess. I did about seven shows.
26:56

GN:
A participant in the show or staff?
26:59

JS:
Yes yeah except, I missed one show and it was
My Three Angels
which was scheduled
to go on the day Kennedy got killed and was postponed for a couple of weeks, that Thanksgiving
weekend.

27:15

GN:
Was Steve Antony or Lanning?

27:17

JS:
Stephen Lanning was around that time. Joe Belanger was after my freshman year. He
was still there my second year and I think Jeptha Lanning came in in sophomore year and then
pretty much.
27:28

GN:
Jim Britt is running back of all of them.
27:30

JS:
Jim Britt was the director of all the years I was here. I did
The Wall, The Visit, A
Hatful of Rain, A Man for All Seasons
. That was my last show. I was Cromwell in that show.
That was a lot of fun. That was in the theater, in the new theater because prior to that it was…
27:54

GN:
Over in Champagnat. When they used to use the gym for… I had Ron Pietro here last
week. Ron is the former basketball coach. He talked about … He’s got a tape of a basketball


practice in that gym. You know it's a really shoe box you know but that's again part of memory
lane.
28:23

JS:
I think a lot of it too is… most of the people who went to this place certainly when I
was here were just garden-variety, run of the mill, middle-class kids who didn't have really big
expectations about anything and so whatever they got was kind of the norm. This is the way it is.
28:40

GN:
Most of them, a good number of them were first-time students of the family to go to
college.
28:45

JS:
Absolutely and the parents weren't sophisticated enough about the whole college
process. And certainly the kids weren't. So other places had the spectacular venues and we never
saw them because we never went to them. And so we didn't have it. You know it's like the old
saying you know my parents were poor but I never knew it.
29:09

JS:
Yeah, we ate every day, we thought that was good enough. Move on after Marist, what
happened after graduation?
29:15

GN:
After graduation, I figured I was going to get drafted. So my plan was to goof off for
the entire summer. And that was my plan and my father asked me, “So what are you going to do
now?” the day I got my diploma and I told him, “Well you know who's going to hire me I am
going to get drafted.” I thought I just kind of like lie around on the beach for the summer and my
father was an Irish immigrant and this did not serve his ethic really well. He said, “You've got a
week. Get a job.” So this is a true story. I think it was Monday, the next Monday. We graduate
on Sunday I guess I don't know. Yeah well within a day or so, I'm sitting down reading the paper
and I see an advertisement for the Catholic High School in Queens that needs an English teacher.
I said I can do that. I had never taught English. I never taught … I never took an education
course I never even thought about becoming a teacher. To me it was just something I didn’t want
to do. I love George Sommer and I love Stephen Lanning. I love the way he taught but that was
not in my thoughts. So I called up and I said, “I see you got an eye out for an English teacher job.
I wonder if I can get an interview?” and they said, “When are you available?” I said, “Anytime.”
She said, “Can you come over in an hour?” I said, “Yeah. I can be there in an hour.”
30:35

GN:
This is for where? Christ the King?


30:36

JS:
Bishop Reilly High School which is now St Francis Prep. Gorgeous building,
gorgeous building, huge. I went over there. The supervising principal sat down with me. Joe
Buckley, he was a priest and I had a job in fifteen minutes. So I came home … It was … I don't
know June 10
th
something like that. I came … My father came home. I said, “Dad I got a job.”
He said, “That’s great.” he said, “What you going to do?” I said, “I am going to be a teacher but
the job doesn’t start till September.” That didn't amuse him either. He said, “You still got to get a
job.” I got a job that summer and I started teaching and ten minutes into my first class I knew
this is what I want to do for rest of my life. I loved it.
31:21

GN:
What were you teaching? You’re teaching English.
31:22

JS:
I was teaching English; tenth grade English and I had to take over a senior class for a
while when somebody gets sick. Those people I know sixty-three years old, sixty-two years old.
31:34

GN:
And what was it? It was across the board. You had composition, speech and drama
and novel and the whole array of….?

31:40

JS:
Yeah. There weren't a lot of electives back then but it was your basic tenth grade
survey course, eleventh grade survey course, twelfth grade. You know…

31:47

GN:
The English region was coming. And you've got to square that. Forget about 5 A.
You’re not going to do it. What was the one all of the twenty questions about literature…
31:58

JS:
Forty questions, you had to take twenty of them. That was the question C. The other
was you taught everyone to take either A or B. Where you could write…
32:07

GN:
Compare two plays, two novels.
32:08

JS:
Yeah right. Yeah. It was a great time. It was six and half years and I loved every
minute of it.
32:16

GN:
And what happened after six and a half years?
32:18

JS:
After six and a half years, I got married. I became department chair at Riley in 1971 or
72 I think. And it was a great time. Well I can only teach two classes. You were only allowed to
teach two classes if you were department chair. I had seven people in my department. I was
twenty-five years old. I was single. I lived down the block from the school. It was like being on


vacation. It was like literally … I was spoiled rotten, spoiled rotten. And then I met my wife. We
met in community theater. I decided it's time to grow up and go out and you know learn what the
real world is like. So I applied for a friend of mine was working in the public schools on Long
Island and an opening occurred in January ‘73 so I went out there. I left Riley on a Friday and
started Walt Whitman High School on Monday as a, you know, garden-variety English teacher.
33:19

GN:
The salary twist was quite significant.
33:22

JS:
Actually it really wasn't. It was about a thousand twelve thirteen hundred dollars
difference because I got a stipend for being a department chair. I had a masters plus some credits
and I think it was about twelve hundred… thirteen hundred.
33:37

GN:
What about the community theater thing? How does fit in here?
33:39

JS:
A friend of mine who was teaching at Riley was going to audition for a play,
You
Can’t Take It with You,
that Kaufman and Hart play. I said, “Geez, I haven't done that in a long
time. I’d like to get back into the community theater.” So we both went to audition and we both
got parts. I played the love interest and my wife, ultimately who became my wife, played the girl
and we did it in a parish over in Bayside. That was June of 1970. We did the play and then we
got married a year later and that's when I decided it was time to move on. I went back to school I
got my certification. I was an administrator because I didn't have any of that when I was at Riley.
You didn’t need any of that I didn't have certification as a teacher until the last year, I was at
Riley. You didn't need if you were breathing and you had a degree you could teach. So my wife
and I got married and I spent the next thirty-four years ago in South Huntington schools.
34:49

GN:
Would you say looking back then that the Marist experience in the classroom played
that significant role for you to go on and become a teacher?
34:59

JS:
Yeah and I didn't … I didn't realize it was going on. You know it was just the kind of
thing that hit me. I honestly, I was not a great fan of Archbishop Molloy High School for all
kinds of reasons. Most of which were my fault but I would have to say that there are one or two
people that I really didn't think were particularly good in the classroom. I thought most of them
were really pretty decent. 100 percent of the people I had at Marist were great and they were
good teachers. They were enthusiastic teachers and they were fun to be around and they were
bright. They were witty. They were articulate and they were friendly and I guess all of that just


kind of got absorbed into me. And when I did suddenly become a teacher and suddenly said,
“Wow, this is great.”
35:52

GN:
It's a nice way of life. You know it's a quality of life and the people you're meeting
and so on. I always thought about that I don't want to put words in your mouth but… this spirit
that you’re exuding here about how it affected you and you went on…
36:07

JS:
If you like it and you're good at it, it's the greatest job in the world. There's no job
better than that. Every day is different. Every day teaching yourself something, you come out at
the end of the day, smarter than you went in that day because you've learned something. You can
really make a kid's life different. You can change a kid's life with and it doesn't take much
sometimes and I always like that and there are kids that I taught that I am best friends with. I still
see them to go to their weddings. I still run into them whether they were really bright or they
weren’t bright at all you know. I still see them all the time in town and it’s nice when they come
up and say I had you in 1974.
36:54

GN:
Fast forward your son coming to Marist. Was that a hard thing for him to? How did
that fit into things?

37:02

JS:
I didn't push him to go to the Marist I was going to let him we took we did the parent
routine of driving around going to campuses, visiting campuses, I mean I knew enough about
how to do this that my parents did not know about. And it was a different world back in 1996
when he was going to college he applied to any number of schools and.

37:27

GN:
Was he bright?

37:28

JS:
Yeah, he was. John is a bright kid. He's a phenomenal writer and that's what he's
making his living at. He's sometimes lazy. I mean he was not a great math kid but he was bright
he got 3.0’s (that three of those and you know where have you.) Indexes and he did pretty well in
high school he could have done better but you know we all could have. What I like about him
most is that he's really a decent kid. You know as I used to tell parents if you can admit that your
blood relation to your kid and not be embarrassed by it, you’re ok. He's a very decent, decent
kid. He applied to about eleven colleges and got accepted into all of them. They all gave him
money of one kind or another. Except Marist. Yep, he didn't get anything from Marist and of


course that's where he chose to go and it was not because I pushed him you know we came up to
Marist, we looked at Marist. We walked around Marist I told him this was what was here when I
was here, this wasn’t here when I was here. It was just his decision so I said OK John where do
you want to go he said.
38:33

GN:
Did he have friends here did he know anybody here.

38:35

JS:
No none of the kids from his high school that he was friendly with came here. And
there were kids from his high school who came here but he didn't really know them. And he was
high school with twenty-five hundred kids. But he liked it very much and he had a good time
here and he did well, got a lot of rewards. Somewhere there’s a plaque with his name on it in the
theater.
38:59

GN:
Was he in theater as well?
39:00

JS:
Yeah, he did some theater here but what he really did was write… He wrote a lot of
shows and he was voted the best student writer of plays… and it was produced up here and he
got.
39:16

GN:
They used to have the competitions the kids would put their own plays on.
39:20

JS:
Yeah, he got a couple of awards for that. And he's making his living doing that now so
but he had a good time up here and it was fun coming back up here when he was here. It was at
that time were you could say, “Wow God Almighty.”
39:36

GN:
Where did he live?
39:37

JS:
Initially he lived in Sheahan then Champagnat and then the town houses across Nine
39:51

GN:
It was the beginning of the new development.

39:53

JS:
Those were gorgeous buildings. Whew, when I think back to where I lived. Those are
like palaces. Incredible.
40:03

GN:
When you come on the campus now what strikes you most? Where do you begin?
This building… you have not been in this building?
40:15

JS:
No. This building was completed the year my son graduated so it was not… It was not
used at that point. It's amazing to me, you know. Even today. As I said the last time I came here


was eleven years ago, it’s almost unrecognizable from then. The buildings that are here now that
the entrance that stone entrance is brand new. It's got to be.
40:38

GN:
This summer.

40:39

JS:
Yeah really impressive because when I first came here, there was a little sign right on
nine that said “Marist college.” And if you didn't know where it was, you would have past it.
Yeah, I was there was no sign way down in Fishkill that said Marist college straight ahead.
There’s none of that. I think it's like a time warp. It really is. It's amazing. It’s beautifully done.
It’s a very well, laid out campus. It’s a very inviting place. I think.
41:12

GN:
So you were here through Linus’ years. But you weren’t here when Murray came on.
Dennis Murray is the president now.
41:17

JS:
No he came in… I guess around the early seventies.
41:21

GN:
Late. ’78. Foy was here for twenty years, the youngest president. He started twenty-
nine and finished at forty-nine. And then Murray came on about ’78, ’79… and has been for the
last thirty-two years or whatever.
41:40

JS:
That's an amazing, amazing run for a college president.
41:43

GN:
It is. They said when Linus left, he had been here twenty years. And I said there will
be never another President for twenty years. This guy is here but he had seen an opportunity to
do something with it. You know I mean we’re not Vassar. They have a lot more over there. The
buildings, campus but they don't have the river. And the river has become such a piece of the
architectural development here saying you're putting things here facing the river. This building in
particular. I want to take you over to the Hancock building later if you have time. That’s that new
building.
42:21

JS:
Yeah, I passed it on my way here.
42:22

GN:
That is another one of the big plan about using the facility…the campus you know to
enhance it and make it so attractive when kids come on this, “I could live here?”
42:43

JS:
The architecture is really striking, very striking.
42:50

GN:
When you were here, it was hardly unknown. And now with you get N.B.C. News
Marist College Poll. The reputation of the place in terms of I don't think I could get in here now.


Much less teach here. So this whole… All the boats went up you know, in other words the
requirements to get in and so on. But there’s still something we had that they don't really have
and that the bonding that was so common that you talked about I think that is really… I don't
know what your son would say about that.
43:30

JS:
No he had the same feeling about it he liked this place. He felt very comfortable up
here and he made a lot of good friends up here. Obviously, it was a bigger place when he was
here and it wasn't that much opportunity to sit down on an informal basis with professors but he
was able to do that occasionally. He was very happy here and I was very happy that he came here
without pushing him to go here and he looks back on this as a fond memory where he actually
learned to be a writer and was able to do had opportunities to do that kind of stuff in a big place.
You know going to U.S.C. Or NYU or places like that, that's probably not going to happen.
44:17

GN:
Do you know who the professors were that he had? That where that writing
developed? Don Anderson, would you know that name? Or Bob Lewis or?

44:24

JS:
He didn't have Bob Lewis because Bob Lewis was here when I was here. John? What
was the name you mention John Anderson?

44:37

GN:
Donald, Donald Anderson.

44:40

JS:
I should have asked him. You know who's the professors were that he had. And I did
not… I mean coming here today.
44:49

GN:
Did he have me? Gus Nolan?
44:52

JS:
I don't think so.
44:54

GN:
Was he an English major?
44:57

JS:
Yeah, he was … No, he was a communications major.
45:00

GN:
Oh he could have had me somewhere along the line. Don't say anything about it. C.
Plus Gus. Couple different questions. I don't know what you would think about it. We spent nine
million dollars to put up a stadium over there you know when they were asking about … They
sent out a survey to the faculty and to the graduates and alumni. What do you think about what


Marist needs? Do we need a science building? Do we need new classroom building? You know,
do we need improvement to the administrative offices? Do we need a new theater? Do you need
a stadium? I had stadium about the bottom of the list. Now I look over at it now and I say this
was really a good investment, you know. You have to be a here on a Saturday afternoon to see
what it can do to a place. We have a marching band now.

46:00

JS: I
think that it’s essential for a school to have that kind of thing going for it because
you need that and lots of people want it whether you think it’s important or not, other people do.
I think you have to be careful not to get so involved in athletics that it becomes the thing that
runs the horse. It runs the show. And a lot of schools, most colleges, most big-time colleges have
football programs that lose money on them. There aren’t all that many, not every place is a Notre
Dame or UFC. It’s costing them an awful lot of money to run a really big time program but it
doesn’t cost all that much money to run a really decent football program that will attract kids. I
mean you’re not looking to become a Division One school here and if you are that’s a huge
mistake. Athletics are an outlet.
46:57

GN:
It is an attraction for I mean I was just talking to Linus Foy again. We were at a
football game. There’s about ninety kids suited up with Marist stinker helmets. Some of them
paying 40,000 dollars to come here and their main attraction, they are good students, what are
you going to do without it? But if you didn’t have a place for them to go and to use all that extra
energy, they would have found someplace else. They are not going to play Notre Dame Football.
Well not that that’s such great … but they have a chance in their own way to kind of make it and
it’s the focus then for that part of the afternoon and all week is in preparation for it so those
things work well.
47:54

JS:
It’s pride and the place it’s something to do. As you said it’s an activity it’s something
you can… get away from books for a while. As long as it doesn't become the thing that drives
the show I think they’re great/ I think that's terrific and Marist has a good reputation with its
basketball teams. It does very well. It’s girls’ basketball, women's basketball very well. Football
is you know you're not going to be Notre Dame but then who is?
48:25

GN:
Were you here for any of the regatta events?
48:29

JS:
Yeah.


48:30

GN:
Again that's … there's a certain dedication involved also in track and where there's
not so much the glory but the person kind of working…?
48:40

JS:
Oh the crew people I mean they were out of bed at four o’clock in the morning, five
o'clock in the morning going down to the river and in the fall.
48:47

GN:
Yeah, it's cool.
48:48

JS:
Yeah, it's cold. I had a lot of admiration for those guys. Wasn't anything that really
interested me? Yeah the guys who did it you know and they did it for four years. I know a lot of
guys I went to school with did it for four years.
49:02

GN:
What's your take on computers?
49:07

JS:
I know what my take is on them in public education. It's probably very different in
college I think well I’ll speak about public education because that's where I've been and that's
where I still am I think they are incredibly overused. I think they have become the be-all and
end-all of classroom observations. I think we're hiring lots of kids who know how to use all of
these things but don't really know a heck of a lot about what they're teaching. I think people have
become utterly dependent upon them. Much too much… As far as educational tools are
concerned there are some things that are really worthwhile and are very good but now we're
talking about using Blackberries as teaching devices. To me that stupid. That’s just utterly
stupid. We're investing lots of money and we're forcing people to make use of these things and I
don't think we really know why we want to use them. My mantra is there is no substitute for a
good teacher who knows what he's or she’s talking about?
50:26

GN:
Good teacher in front of the students. Distance education is kind of a myth. In terms
of a good teacher it’s not a myth… So much is that a good teacher in the York and you're here in
Poughkeepsie or the other way around you know the teacher is here and the students don't come
to campus, they lose a lot, I think.
50:50

JS:
Yeah, a college degree on line is I don't even think it's a college degree quite honestly.
I supervise a lot of young teachers and I said if you are enthusiastic about this and if you
honestly know what you're talking about kids are going to follow you, you're not going to have…
such you won't have discipline problems. Kids become discipline problems when they're bored
and when they feel that you don't really care about them. And you don't really care about what


you're doing. If they like you and they know that you’re working hard and you believe that they
can do with what you're asking them to do, they'll follow you into hell. Most kids will do that.
The vast majority of kids will I don't think I think smartboards are really great for math classes I
think they're terrific for math classes. The rest of the stuff I'm tired of going to classes and seeing
PowerPoint presentations. I'm really tired of that and I tell my kids. I don't want to see that stuff.
I want to see you as a teacher in front of a group of kids because…
51:47

GN:
Talking to them.
51:48

JS:
Talking to them, interacting with them putting on a lesson. Yeah anybody can do a
Power Point. And it doesn't take a lot of skill to do it and it masks a lot of ignorance because
you've got it up there. You know you copied it out of the book and it's up there on the screen and
it's as if you know that stuff well if you need to read that stuff you don't know it. So that's kind of
like my take on computers.

52:14

GN:
Correlation to that though but a kind of part of the same thing, I had the director of,
student activities. A woman here Debbie Bell, she’s the dean of students and one of the question
to her was how have the students changed between your first coming here and now twenty years
later you know. And she talks about a couple of things. One: the number of kids who are drugs
by prescription of the parents or the doctor to keep them warding depression, keep them enthused
you know alert, inspired. And she said you wouldn't believe that part of it. The second, the
loneliness or the inability to make new friends because they have their phones and they are
calling back home and they’re not talking to the kid next to them. That’s one of the little
problems we’re developed here.

53:19

JS:
Walking down the street with the thing in your hand. And then bumping into
everybody because they’re not looking up. It just frosts me. It just drives me absolutely crazy. It
really does because we turned education into sound bites and flash images. Kids are losing their
ability to concentrate because it's hard it's hard to concentrate. You have to force yourself to
concentrate and you don't have to do that anymore and kids don't have to go into the dusty and
maybe that's a good thing but I still … I do enjoy summer's papers and in the library.
Rummaging.



53:58

GN:
Readers guide’s to literature.

53:59

JS: PMLA and JEGP.
Even in grad school when I was in St John's and getting my
master's degree going into the library late at night coming out of there at ten o’clock at night
because I had to do research now. You know you punch it up on Google and there it is. There's a
lot to be said for that. There really was. It taught you an awful lot. Kids are not as smart today as
they used to be and you know, I'm sixty-five, sixty-six years old and that sounds like sour grapes
but they’re not. There was a time when three-point five index actually meant something. Yeah
everybody's got it now everybody's got it now you know if you have got 3.0.
54:45

GN:
The other is the bonding thing. I've taken class here just sitting in a class and soon as
they come out instead of talking to each other, they’re on the phone talking to somebody and so
the lack of that … you talked about everybody else I'm not sure you could say that so much now.
55:06

JS:
No, they are texting everybody else.
55:08

GN:
They're texting that is good number of other people I don't know how wide is that
range.
55:15

JS:
There's a kid in my family who ran up a seven-hundred and twenty phone bill. Wow
seven hundred twenty dollars for a phone bill because of texting and all the apps that he
downloaded onto it. Seven hundred dollars for a phone and it just makes no sense and is getting
worse it's getting worse but it's not helping people become smarter. Yeah, kids were a lot smarter
than fifty years ago and they are now.
55:41

GN:
Key question for you to give me an answer to because it's being put on the table.
Why bother with college? When at the end of it you really don't get the job that you want. You're
paying a lot of money to a good college. What’s in it? Is it worth it? Why?
56:03

JS:
There's a lot of people there are a lot of people who have said that if you took the
money that you spend going to college. Let's say its forty grand now for four years one hundred
sixty thousand dollar you took that money and invested it well maybe not now. Invest But if you
invested ten years ago you probably come out with a really nice piece of change after four years
if you invest that money for four years and went out and worked and didn't go to college and
that's probably a true argument that you would be better off financially. I don't know that
everybody has to go to college I think we've and colleges and schools and parents have argued


that sort of reason that every kid has to go to college no matter what and what comes out of that
is that we have to import all those people who used to be craftsmen. If I go to I bring my car to
the same guy that I've been going to 25 years. Relatively young guy owns his own business. He's
terrific. He's wonderful I love the guy he collects antiques cars but he makes a fortune.
Everybody in my town goes to this guy and he's absolutely honest and he never went to college.
he got a very successful business he runs and he'll be able to retire whenever he wants. I think we
downgrade the goodness and necessity for having craftsmen. When I mean craftsmen, the
mechanics and artisans people that create things whether that's an artist or an actor or whatever it
might be or somebody… a carpenter. I think we need those kinds of things you like and there's a
great nobility in those kinds of professions and there's their necessity.
57:55

GN:
Yeah Christ was one apparently. But how about another take on it? The quality of life
a college opportunity would serve. The readings you’re exposed to. The new ideas. The
associations of friends that you might.
58:15

JS:
Absolutely. Financially it's proven that the person who goes who has a college degree
earns about a million dollars more in his lifetime than I think it's a million dollars maybe it a half
a million dollars more. So from a very mercenary point of view, sure that the college degree pays
off. The intangible things that you're talking about the inquiry, the desire to learn if you go to
college, you never continue to educate yourself it's a waste of time because college should teach
you to do that. It should expose you to things that really can peak your interest in it. You spend a
lot of time after college you looking into and reading about and learning about. Yeah, the
intellectual life of a country depends upon those kinds of people. And I think I think we’ve sold
college simply because it's embarrassing … at least in Long Island I think it's embarrassing for a
family to say my kid doesn't go to college.
59:19

GN:
It’s a cultural, prestige… kind of thing.
59:19

JS:
Long Island is fairly affluent, you know, fairly well educated and I think that’s, we had
these cheating scandals now. Where people are hiring people, we saw that on Long Island.
People hire people to take the SAT for them. Payed like 15,000/25,000 dollars. Because the guy
guarantee them a twenty-two hundred on the SAT and he came though he got it for them. Who
paid for that? The kid paid for it? Maybe. I think a lot of parents paid for it, paid that kind of
money, you know that dishonest kind of thing. No matter what it is … Get my kid into a really



good school. I think we've become mercenaries about it a lot. I don't think I think if you go to a
college, I think you go to a place like this. It's not hug. I have wonderful memories of this place it
was a very different place back now but I see a lot of that's still here and I saw it when my kid
was here. It's preserved a lot of what I found really enjoyable about this place. And that was not
just good teaching and it was not just living in three brand-new buildings. It was a whole ethos
that existed here. And then I just found myself really comfortable with. Does every kid have to
go to college? No. And I think we shortchange people who do by saying that.

01:00:41

GN:
Jim, it’s been wonderful talking to you. It’s about an hour or so we've been here I
am going.