Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


1







Brother Richard Rancourt




Marist College

Poughkeepsie, New York

Transcribed by Mary Ellen Lent

For Marist College Archives and Special Collections




























Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


2



Transcript – Brother Richard Rancourt




Interviewee
: Brother Richard Rancourt

Interviewer:
Richard Foy

Date:
21 February 2002

Location:
Archives Room in the Cannavino Library



Topic:
Marist College History



Subject Headings:


Rancourt, Richard, Joseph


Marist Brothers – United States – History


Marist College- History


Marist College – (Poughkeepsie, New York)


Marist College – Social Aspects


Comments:
Brother Richard discusses his journey becoming a Marist Brother
and his commitment to his teaching career and the Marist Brothers.


Summary:
Brother Richard recalls his early childhood, his family and his early
education. Brother Richard discusses his many experiences in becoming a Marist
Brother. His talent as a pianist and his many different teaching roles .His commitment to
the Marist Brothers and their teachings.











Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


3




Richard Foy:
Okay, this is an interview conducted with Brother Richard Rancourt.
We are in the Archives room of the Cannavino Library. The date is the 21
st
of February,
2002. The interviewer is Richard Foy. Good morning Brother Richard.
Richard Rancourt:
Good morning.
R.F.
We would like to get some of your early biographical information. What is your
full name?
R.R.
Richard Joseph Rancourt.
R.F.
Okay, where you named after any other family members?
R.R.
Not to my knowledge. I’m the first Richard.
R.F.
When where you born and where?
R.R.
I was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, October 30, 1930.
R.F.
Okay, do you have any brothers or sisters?
R.R.
I have a brother, Victor.
R.F.
Okay, he’s no longer alive, right he died.
R.R.
He passed away many years ago.
R.F.
Okay, where did you grow up?
R.R.
I grow up in Lawrence, Massachusetts and lived there most of my life until I went
away to become a Brother.
R.F.
Where did you go to grammar school?
R.R.
Well, I went to St. Rita’s School. St. Rita’s and St. Mary’s were affiliated but one
was in another part of Lawrence and I had cousins who went to St. Rita’s, which was also


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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associated with St. Mary’s Parish. So as a student I went to St. Rita’s School for six
years, first grade to the sixth grade and then we were transferred over to St. Mary’s which
was in another part of town where we had the seventh and eighth grade. And St. Mary’s
also had an elementary school but that was for another section of the city. Then from
there I, I graduated from St. Mary’s in ‘44 and went to Central Catholic High School.
R.F.
Was that your first association with the Brothers?
R.R.
That was my first association with the Marist Brothers. At St. Mary’s I had the
Xaverian Brothers but I also lived on West Street in Lawrence, Massachusetts and at the
end of West Street we had a school there called St. Ann’s School, which was run by the
Marist Brothers. I remember the Marist Brothers used to walk down West Street and
pass by my house and they wore these cassocks and white rabbas. I thought they were
different from the Xaverian Brothers and so I knew the Marist Brothers at least by
appearance. I didn’t go to St. Ann’s because that was for French speaking students and
my aunt and my mother thought I would go with my Irish cousins to St. Rita’s.
R.F.
What about your parents, what where there occupations?
R.R.
Oh, my father worked in the gas company in Lawrence and my mother worked at
the windmill.
R.F.
So they both were workers?
R.R.
Yes, just ordinary, you know, they had ordinary jobs and did their thing.
R.F.
How did your father, when did your father die, how old where you when he died?
R.R.
Oh, my father died when I was about forty, oh let me see when I was forty-two
years old; I was in St. Agnes High School then.
R.F.
Oh, okay he was alive quite a bit.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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R.R.
Yes, my father and mother lived quite a long time.
R.F.
Now apart from your regular education you also are quite good as a pianist or
organist. [Laughter]
R.R.
Yes, I am.
R.F.
How did you get started that way?
R.R.
Well, we had a piano in the house and my grandmother used to play the piano. So
I think she tried to teach me once. I really probably wasn’t very interested. But she
would play a lot of songs that I enjoyed and I used to tinker with the piano and one time I
was playing with it and my uncle came along and he said “Well, would you like to take
lessons”? and I said “Well yes,” so he would pay for them. So I began to take lessons
and took lessons and everybody thought I was going to quit because I had taken dancing
lessons once and I didn’t like that. [Laughter] People called me a sissy. [Laughter] So I
figured that piano would be better so I took piano lessons for three years from sixth,
seventh grade, eighth grade and the ninth grade and that’s all. I kept playing and playing
and when I went away to be a Brother, the Brothers where very, very helpful. They
where like self-taught musicians, Brother Paul Ambrose, Brother Adrian and Brother
Edmund and they all used to take a great interest in the fact that I could play and so they
thought I was going to be geared to be an organist and all that so they helped me along
and so I learned quite a bit from them you know. I kept playing and practicing and it all
comes together and I got interested in people who knew music and I used to visit them
and we played some songs and they showed me different techniques.
R.F.
Was Brother John Colbert any influence on you. He was a pianist from Lawrence
also.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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R.R.
Yes, he was. I lived with a John Colbert. I didn’t know him well because he was
four years ahead of me in profession and I knew that he was an individual who played by
ear more than being able to read music. I don’t know if he ever took any lessons in a
formal sense you know but he was highly praised as a very capable musician and I used
to listen to him play now and then particularly when I came over to the chapel for
Vespers on Sundays in the St. Ann’s Hermitage and he would play the organ for Vespers
and I thought someday that might be my profession. [Laughter] I would follow in his
footsteps, which I did a couple years later.
R.F.
Yes, what about Brother Damian?
R.R.
Brother Damian Victor?
R.F.
Damian Victor Callaghan.
R.R
. Well, he was three years ahead of me but also I heard that he was quite an
exceptional pianist and he used to play mostly with my music and I believe and he was a
classical pianist.
R.F.
Yes.
R.R.
He had a pretty good repertoire there and a good hand spread I believe and he
had a different position from John Colbert. John Colbert was a kind of entertainer and he
was a natural player. Brother Damian Victor, the beat when you read music, he was very
good in what he did. It was just a different style.
R.F.
Yes, technically must more advanced.
R.R.
Yes, yes.
R.F.
Okay, how many years did you spend up in Lawrence in Central Catholic?


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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R.R.
I just spent one year. I went there as a freshman in 1944 and I left for Esopus in
August 1945.
R.F.
Now, there was a Juniorate at Tyngsboro which is only ten miles away, how come
you wound up in Esopus?
R.R.
Well, it was easy enough because this Juniorate that was in Tyngsboro was
suppose to be for the young people who could speak French and I didn’t speak French
fluently at the time. So like when Joseph Belanger went to Tyngsboro, he had come from
St. Ann’s which was a French school run by the Marist Brothers. I had gone to St.
Mary’s and then to St. Rita’s and so there’s another guy in my class, Bill Connors, from
Central Catholic and we where both going to go to school to prepare to be Brothers at the
Juniorate. And it was that year in my freshmen year in Central Catholic that Tyngsboro
finally went to… We’re going to take the English speaking children as well. So I had an
option. I had an option to either go to Tyngsboro or to go to Esopus but since Brother
Alexander Joseph, Joseph Alexander was like my mentor in Central Catholic when I was
there and he was the one who recruited me and Bill Connors. Since Bill was going to go
to Esopus I thought it best to go to Esopus. I wouldn’t back out on my deal so off I went.
R.F.
Good, how many years do you spend in Esopus?
R.R.
About two years, two whole years, my Sophomore year in high school and my
Junior year in high school.
R.F.
Okay and then, now we begin your stay in Poughkeepsie. [Laughter]
R.R.
My odyssey. [Laughter]
R.F.
So you came over here, what year did you come here?
R.R.
I came here in 1947 in September.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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R.F.
And that first year you finished your high school when you were a Postulant?
R.R.
Yes, yes.
R.F.
At the old Beck mansion?
R.R.
I think that time too, I’m not sure if there was enough room for the Novitiate, I
know one time there wasn’t enough room and some people stayed behind and came later.
R.F.
I’m not aware of that.
R.R.
Yes, because you know the Postulant began officially in January, a six month
thing.
R.F.
Yes, that’s right a six month thing.
R.R.
So there was some kind of a, I mean if I go back in my memory I could maybe
scratch some of it out. So I came here in September and stayed in the Novitiate for two
years.
R.F.
Who was your Master of Novices?
R.R.
We began with Brother Henry Charles, was the famous Master of Novices.
R.F.
He was mine.

R.R.
He was the former Provincial, very tough discipline person you know very small
but he knew what he wanted and he knew how to get it. So we were very, very obedient
in those days. He used to give us his lectures and his sermons and teach us how to work
during the week we had two or three working periods. He assigned me one time to help
him. I remember that very well to be a carpenter and I was supposed to fix the front
porch of the Novitiate with him. I think after two meetings with him he recognized that I
was not a carpenter. So I was assigned to weed around the bee hives so I did that that.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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That was one thing. [Laughter] Well, my talents lay somewhere else, not with carpentry
work anyway.
R.F.
Right.

So you did your Novitiate. Do you recall the cemetery?
R.R.
Oh, very well.

R.F.
How did the Novices and Postulants relate to the cemetery, did you visit it?
R.R.
Well, it was very close to the Novitiate there at the Beck estate. In fact I often,
when I go and walk around

there now it’s almost like the same curve you take, you take
the turn as you’re close to that football field, you take a right then you take a left but the
left would take you by the bee hives. You remember by St. Mary’s and by the cannery,
we used to have a cannery there, a building for that. And then we go all the way down to
the cemetery which really wasn’t too far. Well, it was a nice place to visit. We used to
go there every evening to say the De Profundis in Latin.
R.F.
Out of the depths.
R.R.
Yes, I can’t say that I know it by heart now but I could say it before, the De
Profundis. I still have part of it and then we used to say the little prayer and then we’d go
back. That was after the evening recreation you remember then after we said the prayers
for the Brothers down in the cemetery then we’d go back to the Novitiate and study for
an hour before we had more prayers and then off to bed we would go. But it was, we
didn’t make too many visits to the cemetery. It was there and it was a nice place to go
and to be calm and relaxed and look at some of the names of people that you knew.
R.F.
Where any Brothers buried during your two years here?
R.R.
Yes, in fact Brother Adolph Armond who was one of our teachers, he died
unexpectedly in January in 1949 and he was teaching me Spanish because I was a Novice


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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then. I took Spanish with him and he passed away and we went there and then Emile
Nestor also he was buried. Some of the old Brothers who where living over in the
Provincial house had passed away.
R.F.
Were you involved in digging the graves?
R.R.
No, that also wasn’t one of my talents. [Laughter] I never did anything like that.
R.F.
But some Novices did.
R.R.
I think some Novices did, yes, but I just never did it. And when I used to go there
because it was a very nice cemetery where they had the flowers on each grave and they
had a little like a little cement wall around, you remember that thing?
R.F.
Yes, white stone wall all the way around.
R.R.
White stone, yes, very tastefully done. One of my fondness recollections is that
later, later on when I was living in the Gate House, this goes back to about 1984
something like that. One day one of the workers at the college brought over to the gate
house, I was there, a plaque, a slab that the Brothers had on there grave stone with their
name and the grave when they died, you know how many years were they in their
profession and so forth. And he gave that to me, the worker did. So I took it and I
when… In the evening I went over to see Brother Nilus who was living up in the
penthouse on top of Champagnat and I said to him, I said “I have a slab down over in the
Gate House.” Brother Nilus had an office there in the Gate House at that time, I said I’m
going to put it in your office and I said I think the Brothers are coming back to haunt you.
[Laughter] Because a story attached with that little cemetery and I still have the slab up in
my apartment.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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R.F.
Alright that’s a new fact for me because I was under the impression that Brother
Nilus kept the slabs there when he covered the cemetery.
R.R.
Maybe he did I don’t know. I don’t know how this thing showed up you know.
R.F.
He may have kept one as a model. They have little concrete monuments with a
cross. They turned those down over the flower beds and left it there and then gradually
moved in the walls.
R.R.
Well, I picked up one. I don’t know if anybody wants it. It’s like those slides that
I have.
R.F.
You can put it in the Archives. [Laughter]
R.R.
[Laughter] would you like to have it?
John Ansley (Archivist):
It would be interesting.
R.R.
It’s heavy, not heavy, heavy but if you would like to have it I would certainly give
it to you.
R.F.
It would be interesting to take a picture of it and put it onto the website for the
college because we don’t have that many pictures of the cemetery. We have one where it
is surrounded by a wire fence.
R.R.
Yes, didn’t I show you that? Maybe I have a picture, I have that big picture of
that one.
R.F.
Then we have, we have that one in, bring it also. Now there’s a couple of pictures
with the white but I’m sure that left the pictures before he decommissioned it. Well, okay
let’s move on now by this time its 1949 I believe and you now have become a full
fledged Brother.
R.R.
With the Vows.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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R.F.
With the Vows and you get moved over to the Scholasticate. Who was your
Master of Scholastics?
R.R.
Oh, I guess that’s what I wanted to tell you to about my Master of Novices. I did
have Brother Henry Charles for my first year and I think somewhere in either that year or
in the second year probably at the end of the first year he was replaced by Brother Louis
Omer. Then Brother Louis Omer became my Master of Novices for one year. He was
very different from Brother Henry Charles. [Laughter] Henry Charles although he played
but not quite right to talk about this but when we played baseball even on a really hot, hot
day, we had to wear long sleeves on our shirts to keep our arms all covered up. And we
had sneakers and we had long pants and all of that and so it was taboo to wear like a t-
shirt around or any colorful shirt. In fact one time my mother sent me for Christmas a hat
and the hat was red and orange and a big, big yellow ribbon up on top of it or pom-pom,
whatever and Henry Charles said “You have to get that dyed. It’s too fancy”. [Laughter]
So I had to get it dyed and then I could wear it. But coming back to playing baseball,
whenever we went out we always had to dress properly but not a tie but we had to have
those sleeves, the long sleeves. Well, along comes Brother Louis Omer. He was
Provincial and so we played baseball one day and he was going to play baseball with us
so we all got out there waiting on the field and along comes the Master of Novices and
he’s wearing a t-shirt. You know, his arms are bare and we’re looking at him and we’re
shocked by all this and so he said, “Next time you come out you can wear t-shirts too”.
[Laughter] So we did and that was like breaking an old code.
R.F.
[Laughter] That’s right.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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R.R.
It was kind of a some kind of predilection for things to come you know, the wave
of new religious life and I had that.
R.F.
He was an amazing man when I was a Scholastic. He used to play baseball and if
you walked him he would get furious and refused to go to first base. He was sixty by this
time. He wanted to hit the ball.
R.R.
Yes, I remember to in the Novitiate at the, when we had a little recreation after
supper and in the winter months there was a little piano down in the recreation room and
so since I play the piano, I would play songs. And some of the songs where honky-tonky
songs that I would play in the Novitiate and Henry Charles didn’t like it and he told the
Prefect he said,” I don’t like the way some people are playing all this modern music
down there.” [Laughter] He told me to play something a little bit more sacred so I said
okay. [Laughter] You know, I doubt to get out from under his wings you know.
R.F.
Well, it’s indicative or symtemic of what the attitude was when you went into
training to become a Brother or a Priest or a Nun. You’re suppose to get away from the
world. You got a different name because you where now a new person and the things of
the world were not suppose to encroach upon you. So you really shouldn’t have wrist
watches, you shouldn’t have... listen to the radio, no papers because all these things were
bad influences.
R.R.
And there were a lot of other things that I found it hard to reconcile. You see we
had, Christmas would come along and we’d have a nice crib, this was the Novitiate and
we had the crib right next to where I was kneeling and in front of me was the altar and
there was another bench in front of me then the altar and I was one of the small guys so
right next to me was the crib. The baby Jesus was in the manger and the Blessed Mother



Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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and St. Joseph. Well one morning, we didn’t have mass and we could not go over to the
Provincial House because the place was all snowed up we couldn’t get the priest. And
this was right about two days after Christmas so got a little
button-button
meant that we
sleep maybe a half hour later instead of getting up at five o’clock we got up at five-thirty.
That was a big accomplishment in those days, a big treat. It didn’t happen very often but
after we said our morning prayer, the Master of Novices said, “Now we’ll…” In the
afternoon he said that since we have missed mass we will go to our chapel over here in
the Novitiate which was in that same building and he said “We’ll do the Stations of the
Cross.” [Laughter] So I was kneeing down at three o’clock in the afternoon or four
o’clock in the afternoon and I was looking at the baby Jesus and they were saying the
Stations and talking about the one Station he falls for the first time [Laughter] and baby
Jesus I said listen this is kind of reverse physiologically in balance for me you know
[Laughter] if I keep this up. But anyway we went through it and I just couldn’t
understand at that time why we had to say the Stations of the Cross at Christmastime. It
was incongruity there but we had a lot of those incongruities in the Novitiate. That was a
time to train us and to test our will and to break it if possible. [Laughter] You know it
was really infantry it was like a military life, you went there and they were going to put
go through all kinds of tests, I believe and we told horror stories. I’d say horror stories
you know, the old people who had gone to the Novitiate before us would say it’s very,
very hard, very disciplined but they went through it. You remember well I’m sure.
R.F.
You developed a fraternity of misery so everybody else was being subject to
about the same so you learned to endure it.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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R.R.
Yes, and I never… Linus Williams who was our Master of Juniors when I was in
Esopus was very well, more kind of modern person and he was a different type of a
Master. Brother Henry Charles was too but Henry Charles was in Canada in kind of the
old school but I remember Linus William that was a Junior, he was talking us about his
Novitiate and when he was saying about this about the Novitiate he says he spent the
happiest days of his life. And I must confess when I went through the Novitiate I didn’t
find it to be the happiest days of my life.
R.F.
Nor did I. [Laughter]
R.R.
And it’s like a train more and more Philosophy something. Now when I teach
Philosophy I tell people when people talk about they’re married or the day of their getting
married is the happiest days of their lives, some women you know would get a little bit
effervescent about these things and about a lover and I’d say if that’s the happiest then
there’s nothing else to look forward to. [Laughter] Enough said about the happiest days
of my life [Laughter] I said want else is there to come you know, certainly the Novitiate
although it was nice and I enjoyed it very much, it probably wasn’t one, couple of my
favorite years. The Scholastic, I enjoyed my Scholastic. And yet, I don’t regret the
Novitiate I liked it. I liked it, take it as it comes.
R.F.
Well you came over to the Scholasticate in ‘49 and you were a freshman. You
haven’t taken any college courses?
R.R.
No, because I had graduated in the Novitiate from high school.
R.F.
No, I mean older students who came in like Cornelius Russell was in my group.
R.R.
Yes, in my group we had Harry Jones and we had Denny Murphy and Raymond
Siefert and a few others. These are the fellows who come to my mind right now.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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R.F.
These guys had taken some college courses.
R.R.
Yes, well they were actually about four years ahead of me in academic life. They
graduated from high school in ’44. I graduated from grammar school in ’44, you know.
And then he went to the service too.
R.F.
Yes, Harry Jones listed in the service for a couple of years.
R.R.
When Harry Jones came to the Novitiate, he was an experienced individual and
when he out to weed around the rhubarb patch he wore his best clothes because his other
clothes hadn’t come yet. And there was a sign for the rhubarb patch and there he was and
I walked by him and he was with the shovel and doing the work he had to do. He had his
watch on and he had everything and I said “The poor guy he’ll never stay” and he did, he
stayed. He stayed.
R.F.
Yes, he did. He was a good friend of mine.
R.R.
Yes, he was. He just adapted as the rest of us did and they used to go over to the
Scholasticate for courses, those people who where taking college courses.
R.F.
Yes, they would go over and take the courses.
R.R.
Yes, yes.
R.F.
Well, when you arrived at the Scholasticate, Brother Paul Ambrose was the
Master of Scholastics.
R.R.
Yes, he was.
R.F.
And who were your other teachers?
R.R.
Oh, for Chemistry we had Brother Adrian August and he was the organist you
know and he was the musician or music teacher in the Novitiate. And then we had
Brother Francis Xavier for Mathematics. Brother Paul Ernest taught us Logic and then


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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we had Dr. Schroeder and we had Georgie Burns the Historian. We began with Stephen
Aime.
R.F.
Victor Aime.
R.R.
Victor Aime, yes, he taught us History for one year. I think in the next year he
went to Novitiate in Tyngsboro.
R.F.
He died, didn’t he?
R.R.
Oh, later in Tyngsboro, I remember having Georgie Burns come and teaching us
you know. George, there’s a house that’s being named after him here.
R.F.
Yes, the Burn Residence. Yes, he came my senior year so he came in ‘49 or ‘50
and he taught Economics.
R.R.
So you were a senior when I was freshman?
R.F.
Right, so how did you find life, you say you enjoyed the Scholastiate?
R.R.
Well, I liked it. I liked it because well we had our studies and they were always
very well organized and we had our time to study and we had a little more freedom. You
know, you always went in groups you could go to the library when you wanted to go to
the library. And you could do different things and I know Brother Paul Ambrose who
was always interested in my getting better at music would allow me to go over to the
chapel and I would go to the chapel maybe three, three days a week for a half hour or an
hour to play the organ and practice and that’s where they really helped me out with the
books you know and gave me books. It was a different environment than the Novitiate
here. They where trying to help you cultivate some of the talents that you have that
would be worthwhile as a teacher and an educator, also stressing the spiritual life. We
had a lot of interesting things that we did in the Novitiate rather than in the Scholastiate,


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


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like we had the plays and we where able to maybe take a walk outside of the grounds.
We didn’t do that too often in the Novitiate. We had that big wall there but every now
and then, you could go to Brother Paul and say “Might I go out with two other Brothers?”
Remember we used to go out in three’s and off we’d go walking and come back and we
thought we where kind of treated with more maturity perhaps you know. Then also they
used to take us to the IBM plant and to see that so there were a lot of things that they tried
to adapt our interest in and Brother Paul was pretty modern in his own way and seeing
into the future about the life of a Brother, I believe anyway. And his sermons, his talks
when we talked you always had a good point to them and he was kind of practical
minded you know and then he would take care of our, like send us to the doctor. He did a
lot of things for us I believe, you know. So I enjoyed the Scholastiate pretty much. I was
in charge of the typewriters. That was my
key
. We all had
keys
and my
key
was to fix
the typewriters so I learned how to do that, not that I learned how to do it efficiently but I
did it and in those days too no one taught us how to type you just had to go up there and
start to type. And I was just lucky because I played the piano so I got pretty good at it in
the beginning you know.
R.F.
Yes, the typewriters… The typewriter room was upstairs over the central rec
room, maybe twelve or ten typewriters.
R.R.
Yes, well we all had a lot of little different things that Brother Paul would do.
Like the day before Lent started, he would get us down into the big studying room area in
front of the Marian Building and he would give us ice cream, you know, bring some ice
cream around 7:30 at night and some soda, cookies and there were about sixty of us there
then.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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19
R.F.
That was your Mardi Gras. [Laughter]
R.R.
Yes, that was it. It was a nice little celebration where as we didn’t do those things
you know in the Novitiate. Brother Paul had a little more of a secular thrust I suppose.
R.F.
But did you ever take a walk to Esopus?
R.R.
Yes, I did. I did that ten mile walk on January 26
th
was it, St. Paul’s Day and we
used to, you could take the bus over there if you wanted to I believe.
R.F.
Not in my day, in your day maybe.
R.R.
Maybe not in mine either. We took a bus back I know. Yes, I made that trip.
The three of us went all the way over, walked over the bridge and all the way up Route 9,
9A.
R.F.
9W.
R.R.
9W and it was a long walk. And when we got there and then we would go under
the clock in the English village and we’d all meet there. Then the bus came or the truck
came and brought the food over for us and we had a nice picnic. And also I found about
the mission to go back when I talk about the picnic. We got our outings to the Novitiate
every three months or so and I used to love to go over to Esopus or any other place. They
had a lot of food there, like pancakes. [Laughter] It might sound pretty simple but when
you can make your own pancake outside near the boathouse and you could go back for
seconds and thirds and no one looked or looking at you, you know, it was quite a treat I
thought. [Laughter] We had different foods, little special things like peaches and things
that we didn’t have in the Novitiate on a steady basis. Although we used to have our
peanut butter and honey. That was always interesting. I still make that myself. I buy


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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20
some peanut butter and some honey and mix it and have it with toast. I remember the
Novitiate all the time when we had that.
R.F.
That was the Sunday night supper with French bread. [Laughter]
R.R.
Even for lunch we had it.
R.F.
Did you ever go to Camp Sunset?
R.R.
Yes, I did. I went to Camp Sunset and I remember how we had those cabins and
then when we got up in the morning we had to go wash and we had to go down to where
the basins were, where the faucets were, where the sinks were. It was down a big hill and
I remember getting up early enough well, and then we had our prayer, whatever we did
then but I remember getting up and I was running down the hill. I just forgot that the
momentum would carry me faster than my legs would work. [Laughter] I rolled down
most of the hill until I got to the basin. [Laughter] I also remember too, we had the play
we had to have a little church there.
R.F.
Yes, very nice chapel.
R.R.
Yes and it had an organ but the organ had to be patched up where the pumps were
and all of that, the bellows. So this little Chinese Brother, Peter Bosco, I was talking to
him and he said, “Well, we can fix that up” he said because he was more mechanically
inclined that I was. So we went to Brother Paul Ambrose’s infirmary which was at the
camp Sunset. Brother Paul Ambrose wasn’t there so we took his tape, all the tape he had.
We when back to the chapel and we fixed the organ so I was able to pump it and we were
about to get music out of it and air and all that. When Brother Paul came at nighttime
and looked for the tape, he couldn’t find the tape. He wondered what had happened to it.
And we told him I guess or maybe Brother Peter Bosco confessed but Brother Paul


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


21
Ambrose didn’t get upset you know he just said, “Well…” he said, “You should have
asked me. I would have gotten you some good tape.” I remember those were very, very
good summer days in Camp Sunset. We didn’t have much. We had that pond. We used
call it the pond and then we had singing at night and all used to sing and tell stories and
we worked. We had a lot of freedom then. Of course there wasn’t anyplace to go.
R.F.
That’s right. [Laughter]
R.R.
[Laughter] It was a nice place to socialize and do different things and read and
have the time to yourselves.
R.F.
Some of the slides that you donated, I’ve been able to isolate about fifteen slides
on Camp Sunset. I’ll probably ask you to identify who the people are.
R.R.
Oh, yes. Sure.
R.F.
They were almost certainly taken around in ‘49 or ‘50 or ‘51.
R.R.
Remember, we had that big hall where we used to eat.
R.F.
Yes, that’s another interesting connection. Sunset Lake is the origin or source for
Black Creek, which is the creek which runs past Esopus on the end that’s past New Paltz
and all the way up in the hills. Of course the Marist property ran but they didn’t know
that connection. I just discovered that. It was very interesting, it was a nice camp. It was
used mostly I think for the Juniors and the Student Brothers for vacation. It was never
used as a public camp, all the Marist Brothers.
R.R.
When Henry Charles was the Director General after those years of being a Master
of Novices, I remember he had a little… He had a station wagon. He didn’t drive it but
he had someone driving, someone could drive it and he was like in charge of Camp
Marist (Sunset). He fixed it up. He was the one who painted it and did all that kind of


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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22
stuff. I was very fond of Camp Marist (Sunset) and about ten years ago one Sunday
afternoon I took a car and drove out there and I found it. It was nice going back to it
again and looking over but the houses are gone. I didn’t see the chapel and of course
those cabins were all gone but you could see the terrain and then I haven’t been back
there since. I’d like to go back and see it, maybe ten miles from here, maybe fifteen.

R.F.
It’s by Plattekill, it’s just hard to find.
R.R.
It’s just hard to find but the college sometimes used to have dances at Villa
Baglieri?
R.F.
That was the landmark. That’s where you made your turn.
R.R.
You made your turn, you know when I went there for the college dances I
remember Villa Baglieri right down the way to Camp Sunset. And when we were at
Camp Sunset as young Brothers, we would take a walk and see Villa Baglieri and you
know you look at these places, these nice restaurants and you say well someday I’m
going to go to those restaurants and have a meal, something descent. [Laughter] But we
didn’t do that too much then. I remember we would be taking college students to the
dance and chaperone. That’s where I went, I would chaperone. [Laughter]
R.F.
How many years did you spend as a Scholastic?
R.R.
I spent two years as a Scholastic.
R.F.
It was supposed to be three, wasn’t it?
R.R.
It was supposed to be three, right. And one of the things was that in those days
they would tell you what you where going to major in or you would pick and you know
some years they were like Mathematics and Science or Languages. And in my year we
could choose from Biology and English. I don’t think there were any others. I didn’t


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February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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23
want to major in English and so I majored in Biology and I didn’t care for it too much.
So when I got into my sophomore year we took courses from the Brother Aloysius. It
was Brother Aloysius that came from St. Ann’s Academy who taught Biology and he was
Marcel Henry’s brother I think it was, do you remember him? Anyway, they where good
teachers and we took the courses and we did well, we even had experiences, we had a cat,
we found an old cat so we gassed it and we went around like a bel-jar and where we cut
it up we couldn’t afford to buy one. I only add that. I don’t know if we could afford to
buy one. We didn’t have too many frozen products in those days but it was an
experience. [Laughter] And the guys there were Damien, Brother Hyndsman and Brother
Bill Buckley, those fellows were also Biology majors and they were part of the group.
And when I became a sophomore I thought I would like to go into Mathematics so I
decided to. I said to Paul Ambrose, “If you need some teachers I’d be glad to go out” and
so they took me at my word and he said “You’ll be going out teaching after your
sophomore year”. He told me this when I was a sophomore. I was only twenty years old
at the time and when I got the assignment it was to St. Helena’s High School in the
Bronx. I was supposed to teach the seventh grade. They didn’t want to put in high school
because they thought I looked too young, so we went over to Esopus to work. Do you
remember how we used to go into Esopus to work to build the Juniorate? And that was
one of the things we did in the Scholasticate, we went over for weeks and worked. Well,
when I went over to Esopus, I remember working with the Brothers there for one week
before we went to our assignments outside and then Tommy Austin was now a Provincial
and he came over and he said,” I think I’m going to change you from St. Helena’s
because there’s not a piano there or an organ there and you would have to go over to the


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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24
church, St. Helena’s which was quite a distance from the school.” So I didn’t know where
I was going to go; he said you might go to St. Ann’s Academy. Well, I wound up going
to St. Michael’s. I guess I was the only guy who had three assignments in one week.
[Laughter]
R.F.
That’s Mount St. Michael’s
R.R.
Mount St. Michael’s yes, I’m the only fellow who had three assignments in one
week you know, they didn’t know where to put me. [Laughter] From there, Mount St.
Michael’s, I wasn’t so keen on going to the Mount actually and my reason was that
Mount St. Michael had a football team that used to come to Lawrence, Massachusetts and
play Central Catholic and beat Central Catholic all the time. [Laughter] So I said I’ll get
even with those Mount kids. [Laughter] So I went to the Mount, Brother John Lawrence
was the Director and he had been my principal at Central Catholic. I knew him well and
I felt comfortable enough and I was assigned to teach the sixth grade in 1951. We had a
nice time; it was a pleasant experience because I did a lot of things. In the afternoon
we’d go to recreation. I would organize the baseball game for the kids. We would stay
out a half hour instead of fifteen minutes and then I would get up and play with them and
I still was not very good at baseball but I was pretty sensational with the sixth graders.
[Laughter] So it was very nice and I enjoyed that and I only taught sixth grade for one
year and then after I went to teach high school. I keep in touch or rather there are some
students around that sort of keep in touch with me that I had in the sixth grade. One of
the things that was funny in the sixth grade was one parent and the name was Wall, Mrs.
Wall. She said to me one day when she was coming for her son at three thirty in the
afternoon she said, “Oh, my son enjoys your class” and she says you know, she says


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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25
“Isn’t it wonderful?” she says to “As a teacher growing up with the students.” [Laughter]
I guess that’s right, I’m just twenty, and I said “Thank you, thank you very much.” We
had a lot of fun, it was interesting and it was the same class in fact that Brother Edward
Lawrence had in fourth grade. Brother Ed Lawrence taught the fourth grade two years
before I had gotten to the Mount and then I had the same class the same kids that he had,
same students. So we did share a lot of stories, you know.
R.F.
Brother Edward Lawrence is Ed Cashin. He was the Academic Vice President
here for five years. How did you complete your college education?
R.R.
Well, when I got to the Mount we used to have extension courses there at Mount
St. Michael. So I took extension courses at the Mount and we went down to St. Ann’s
Academy for one lesson, like on a Wednesday and Brother Terrance Jones who was
teaching at the Mount was very good in Mathematics and he would teach us Calculus
down in St. Ann’s Academy. We would have a car, sometimes we had a car from the
house and sometimes we would take the football coach’s car, which was staying at the
barn but the director didn’t know that but Terry Jones had the key. [Laughter] And in
those days you could do a lot of things, [Laughter] so we would take the car. There were
four of us, Billy Kane was one of them and Brian Lonergan was another fellow. He
would take extension courses but not the same ones and we took courses like in History.
George Robert taught us History. Cyril Robert taught us Education courses. Bill Murphy
taught us Psychology, Educational Psychology and Terry Jones taught us Mathematics.
So we’d go down, all the way down to St. Ann’s which is about twenty miles from
Mount St. Michael and sometimes we’d go down by subway and most of the time we
would want to go down by car if we could. And then we would come back and stop at


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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26
the Wedge Inn on White Plains, not White Plains Road but Bronx Road or something.
We’d get a wedge and we’d get some soda and that would be our supper. We did a lot of
things like that. And then we also had courses on a Saturday morning, not at the Mount
so the fellows who where at St. Ann’s Academy, these fellow who where taking the
courses would have to travel up to the Mount and take the courses. So I finished the
degree in two years. Instead of graduating from Marist in ’52, I graduated in ‘53.
R.F.
What did you do for post-graduate?
R.R.
Oh, I guess I should tell you. I got my degree in Mathematics from Marist but
then when I went to post-graduate work I switched to Philosophy. It began actually, I
was very ambitious so I thought and I was allowed to take courses in the summer before
we… I never worked for the project. You see the project was building Marist College,
this with everything else. And Linus just thought my fingers where too tender [Laughter]
and as a piano player I shouldn’t be there mixing cement or anything like that. [Laughter]
He said something to that effect. So it allowed me to take courses and I began and I took
a course in Introduction to Geometry, a graduate course and I took Number Theory and I
also took courses in Philosophy with Plato and Aristotle.
R.F.
At Fordham?
R.R.
At Fordham. I went to Fordham. I only just took two courses, one in Math and
one in Philosophy and eventually I did a dissertation on Leibniz on the Introduction to it.
I had put it down in the Mathematical Nature of the Monads but when Betty Sammon,
who was one of my readers saw that the title, she said “You better switch it to an
Introduction to the Study of the Mathematic Nature of the Monad” because she was one
too, a stickler for historical facts. So I got my degree in that and Philosophy and we put


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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27
down majors in Philosophy and Mathematics, stuff like that. Father Sommerville was my
mentor and he had taught me Leibniz and I still like Leibniz actually and Monads and
little things running around. People ask me what it is and I tell them it’s a simple
substance and I let it go at that. [Laughter] So I got my major. Also, when I was at the
Mount taking these courses in ’53, I taught at Marist College extension school because
there was a guy at the Mount, Brother Vincent Dominic, do you remember him?
R.F.
Yes.
R.R.
And he came around to us as assistant principal and he and I got along very well
and he was assigned to teach a course in Marist College extension school, teaching the
Brothers that hadn’t finished. So I hear he was an outstanding teacher in Mathematics in
his day so I said to him “Do you mind if I sat in on your course” and he said, “No, no”, so
I wanted to see his technique so every Friday night we would have the course and he
would go in and he would teach it and I would listen and there were about five other
Brothers there. Then one evening, one week he said to me he said, “I won’t be able to
take the course. Do you think you can handle it for tonight?” and I said, “Sure I can
teach it, I have a degree.” It was Introduction; it was college Algebra. He said “Alright,
could you replace me?” I said “Sure” so I replaced him and the next week I went back
and he came and he taught and the next week later he taught and then he said “Could you
take the course this time? I can’t make it.” I said, “Sure.” Before I know it, I was
teaching the course if you know Brother Vincent Dominic you could understand.
[Laughter] So I taught the course and then I began to teach in the extension school at the
Mount. And then I went on for Ph.D., you know in Philosophy and I got all those


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February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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28
subjects. And I also taught at the extension school in Tyngsboro, I taught the Novitiate
for one year from ‘55 to ‘56.
R.F.
Oh, you were stationed up there?
R.R.
Yes, I taught at the Mount one year of grammar school and then three years of
high school and that was an interesting thing too because when I went to Mount and I
wanted to, they said let him teach in high school. I want to teach a Math course but there
was another Brother called Simeon Earnest who was teaching Spanish and he was
changed to Central Catholic. So the Provincial said “Can you teach Spanish?” Well I
said, “Why sure, I can teach Spanish. I had taken it in the Novitiate.” [Laughter] I had
taken four years of French all through my training and Spanish with Brother Adolf
Armond. We did the two years of regent’s work in six months. We were college kids
then, you know we had a background in language. So that’s when I was going to go to
the high school to teach because [Tommy Austin] put me to the Novitiate because in the
summertime I was there as a music teacher in the Novitiate up there in Tyngsboro and I
was studying Spanish during the day with Brother Leo Hyacinth. But I went to the
Mount and taught Spanish for about three years and Mathematics and then I went to
Tyngsboro for a year and taught in the Novitiate there in Mathematics and Spanish also.
And The Lives of the Early Brothers, remember all those subjects? And I was music
teacher too up there.
R.F.
When you, back tracking just a little bit, didn’t you take courses with the organist
of St. Patrick’s?


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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29
R.R.
Yes, Fred Short, Fred Short his name. He was the organist at St. Patrick’s
Cathedral and he knew the Brothers. Gus Nolan used to bring some St. Ann’s kids down
to the Cathedral.
R.F.
Oh yes, the choir, Gerry Weiss and Gus Nolan.
R.R.
So somehow I got introduced to Fred Short and I told him how I was interested in
learning how to play the organ, so he said, “Well come on down and see me.” So I said,
“Okay.” He said, “I’m playing at the church on Saturday and you could come down and
then after I could give you an hour.” He did this for nothing, I didn’t have to pay
anything. Except that I was teaching at Mount St. Michael in the Bronx and the church I
found out was in Bayridge, Brooklyn. [Laughter] Our Lady of the Angels always comes
back to me know that I think about it so dutifully at noon time like a clock and this was
after cleaning up the gym on a Saturdays bingo, I would get on the subway and go all the
way to Bayridge, practice, did my lesson, he gave me a little music lesson. He showed
me this and he gave me some stuff to study. And then I would go all the way back to the
Mount and got back to the Mount at about quarter past five just in time for the [Vespers]
at half past five. [Laughter] So it was a sacrifice to go all the way down there but I did it.
I did it for like six months and then for some reason I just felt like, I just petered out you
know I didn’t have to go down there anymore.
R.F.
Did you learn anything from it?
R.R.
Yes, yes I did. He was amazing, I mean you should see how his fingers could go
over that keyboard you know and how his feet could go on, his left foot and his right foot
that’s the thing being able to use those pedals and being a lot out of it. I was doing pretty
well with the petals. I don’t practice anymore but I learned a lot and I was able to use my


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


30
feet and get the right touch in combinations and I find it to be very inspirational, the
whole thing. Obviously my eyes just pop out when someone plays the piano and I think I
can learn something.
R.F.
Well, that’s in the Bayridge section. I could tell you where taking the lessons
down at St. Patrick’s Cathedral.
R.R.
Well, I went all the way down to Bayridge, long ride. That was about two hours
from the Mount.
R.F.
Well we’re getting fairly close to the end of my hour I think. How much time
have we got?
John Ansley (Archivist):
About ten minutes.
R.F.
So far we have you off in Tyngsboro teaching some college extension courses.
Of course by that time I believe the training of the Brothers had changed. They were no
longer accepting freshman into the Juniorate. They where doing second, third and fourth
year and then the Postulant was the first year of college. Who was the Master of Novices
at that time?
R.R.
Brother Pius Victor was the Master of Novices. Also interesting, when I was
going to St. Michael’s, I taught there. I took over advanced algebra class in mid-year and
who was in my class but John Malich.
R.F.
Who later became Provincial.
R.R.
[Laughter] And then he said he was going to be a Brother. And when I went to
the Novitiate to teach who was a Novice but Brother John Malich and I taught Tom
Delaney, John Malich, all of that group. I taught them The Life of the Early Brothers.
R.F.
Tom Delaney is a mentor now.


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
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31
R.R.
Is a mentor now, yes, so and that was from ‘55 to ’56. Then I went back to the
Mount for a couple years. Then I taught here on weekends in ’56, ‘57 at Marist.
R.F.
You came down from Tyngsboro?
R.R.
No, no I was in Tyngsboro ’55, ‘56 and then when I went back to the Mount ‘56
to ‘59, Brother Paul Ambrose gave me the assignment, Frank (Bro. Francis Xavier) was
building the St. Ann’s Academy (new Molloy High School) then. He used to go down
there to work down there in ’56.
R.F.
Frank was still here I believe until ’59.
R.R.
We used to meet on the train. Was he living, maybe living down at… Not St.
Ann’s, at Molloy. When did they move to Molloy?
R.F.
I got the impression that Frank moved to Molloy the year you came up here.
R.R.
Full-time.
R.F.
I was named president and Frank, I remember, meeting with the faculty and
asking Frank to stay on because I learned he didn’t want to and he said, “No it’s time to
bring in a new person, Richard Rancourt. This is why I kept making my move to try to
get you up here. So you came here probably in ‘59?
R.R.
I came full-time, ‘56, ’57. I taught on weekends in Ethics and then I got my
degree in ‘59 in Philosophy.
R.F.
That was probably it. Frank said now he’s qualified and get him up here.
R.R.
Yes, yes. Then I came up.
R. F.
So you came up here in ’59?
R.R.
’59, yes.


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February 21, 2002
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32
R.F.
And then so your first tour of duty here as a teacher, as a full-time teacher, began
in ‘59 and when did it go to?
R.R.
‘69.
R.F.
To ’69? That was fast ball.
R.R.
Yes, I was here ten years and then we were finishing the chapel.
R.F.
Yes that was ‘67 and ‘68.
R.R.
I was just living one year, ’68, and then when I was there, I didn’t come back to
Marist. I went to Hayes for a year, Cardinal Hayes one year. I was Director for Hayes
House and then I went to St. Agnes as the principal of the high school for four years.

R.F.
And then you taught at Pace University.
R.R.
And then I went to Pace University and I taught at Pace University for about four
or five years. When I was the principal of St. Agnes, I was taking courses in Educational
Administration at Pace and when I got the degree I asked if I could teach a course. So the
guy said, “Yes, you can teach a course” so I taught part-time when I was principal and
then I went there full-time. The dean had an opening and called me up. He said, “Would
you like to teach here full-time?” and I said, “Yes.” So I did that for four or five years
and then I wound up back here.
R.F.
In what year did you return?
R.R.
Come back?
R.F.
Yes, when did you wound up back here? In the eighties sometime?
R.R.
Well, I came back here in late December 1980. I was talking to Paul Ambrose up
in Lawrence and I was now, I had just finished my work at Pace and I had, I just took six
months to do some private study and so I and he said, “What are you going to do”? I


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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33
said, “Well, I’m going to get job in some college” and he didn’t say anything but then Joe
Bell had visited Paul up in Lawrence and talked about the Refugee Assistance Program
here at the college. They where looking for a director. The Refugee Assistance Program
was a program for Vietnamese refugees, Laotians, Cambodians, any kind of refugees you
can pick up and Joe Bell had a grant. You remember this?
R.F.
I was out of the college by that time.
R.R.
And then I applied for the job because I had been in Guam. I had worked in
Guam for one, for a couple of summers and I had visited tent city where the Vietnamese
were.
R.F.
The refugees.
R.R.
Then I had my language experiences too so I was, I got the job to be the director
for the Refugee Assistance Program. It was funny enough because the guy who was the
majordomo up in Social Services in Albany, the Administrator Joe Ruel was the
best friend of my officemate down in Pace University. He was a Korean guy, Bein Nam
but I got the job not from Bein Nam, I got the job by applying here and getting an
interview. So I stayed on that job for three and a half years. That was a tough job. We
had the Vietnamese, Laotian woman who died. We had the college kids who would tutor
the refugees and I would teach the college kids how to tutor and during their free time
they would come and they would get paid. They get paid maybe four dollars an hour and
so I kept all the records and used to get the car and go pick up the refugees and bring
them back. We had night courses and all day too, every day we had courses and three
and a half years. When I finished that work, the lady who used to come down to loan it
to me she said, “We’re not going to fund this program anymore because there’s no


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

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34
refugees in the area” and so she said, “Would you like to go to Brooklyn because we have
places there?” I said, “No, I think I’d like to go back teaching” [Laughter] It was tough
you know, I liked it and I could have done other things but I said, “You know I’d rather
go to teach.” Now I got a job teaching here in the Math Department.
R.F.
Okay, lets back track to your first tour of duty which was in the sixties. Did you
do, didn’t you do a semester or a year on sabbatical over in Paris?
R.R.
What I did here was I taught here, came in ‘59 and I was you know, I taught a
variety of subjects. I taught the, there were all young Brothers then it was never just, a
little seasoning of lay students. I remember and I taught Ethics, Philosophical
Psychology, Metaphysics. You know and then I used to go to Fordham to take courses
and I did that and finally took my Ph.D. Comprehensive, then I had my sabbatical. Then
I went down to the Mount to study during September of 1963. That was the November
JFK died at the Mount and I took my Ph.D. Comprehensives three Saturdays, six
different areas and I passed the Comprehensives Ph.D. Comps and then in January I went
to Second Novitiate. Do you remember?
R.F.
Yes, you when to Second Novitiate.
R.R.
Yes, in ’64.
R.F.
Who did you go with? Oh Gus Nolan.
R.R.
Gus,

Gus Nolan and maybe Albert was there and John Malachy and all that and
Mattie Snowden.
R.F.
That was the spring of ‘64?


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


35
R.R.
The spring of ‘64 and I came back to the college in ‘64 of September and stayed
here until... Then I went to the Chapter in ‘68 and then after the Chapter I never came
back here. So I always say ten years I was here, that I was associated with the college.
R.F.
And Betty Sammon was your mentor down in...
R.R.
Betty Sammon was my mentor for my... She was my mentor for my…
R.F.
Master’s.
R.R
. Father [something] was the mentor for the Master’s. She was the mentor for the
Ph.D. dissertation and which I still have which is not complete yet. However I had gone
for a degree in Education Administration and when I got that degree I came back to the
college, no I was down at Pace, I was teaching at Pace and I said no sense finishing up
this Ph.D. in Philosophy because the jobs where scarce and I got interested in Education
and I got interested in being a principal. So I went back to Fordham and they gave me a
scholarship at the School of Education. I said, “Okay” and I got the degree, no I wrote
the School of Education and I was working as a student there too in graduate school but
then I got my job at Pace you see so I told the guy at Fordham I can’t keep the job. But
here, at Pace, got the job and take the courses, I took four courses and I eventually got a
Ph.D. in Math Education. Now I go back to finish my Ph.D. in Philosophy but I don’t
know what I’m going to do with it. [Laughter] I mean remember in those days it was
tough when you think about jobs and what they needed, you know. So I did alright.
R.F.
Well, I think we’re going to cut it off here. There’s still a lot we’d like to talk to
you about, either myself or another interviewer in particular, I guess the second interview
will probably concentrate more on your experience as a teacher, your experience with the
Athletic Department and sort of the quasi- Chaplin. And I guess your impression of


Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


36
students and what’s been happening at Marist because you’re been able to watch it now
for almost thirty years so you’ve seen a tremendous amount of transition. So hopefully
we’ll get another session with you, if you don’t mind.
R.R.
Sure. No, no I don’t mind.
R.F.
And meanwhile I want to thank you for everything that you had to say. I think I
was very informative. [Laughter]
R.R.
It just brought back a lot of memories you know, [Laughter] very interesting.
Names came up from my memory now that I had never think of too frequently.
R.F.
Well, when we get to transcribe this we’ll probably have to ask you for some
names, you referred to some Brothers. I’m sure John wouldn’t know them.
R.R.
Oh, yes sure.
R.F.
I probably knew them by nicknames but we won’t get into that. [Laughter]
R.R.
Right, right okay.
R.F.
Okay, thanks very much Richard.











Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


37








































Brother Richard Rancourt

February 21, 2002
Interviewer: Richard Foy

MHP


38