19 10 9760 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/aff58eee66186421a39ddd3e117d0f8b.pdf 776b29fa80df25cd82d6dca71c5ed40e Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-09-29 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 9/29/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/9bf35c50e93df82b2af2a2e6a25ed396.pdf 002259ac16c385fe180db5610a507628 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-10-06 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 10/6/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/f59be8aae91f0f600c6961d173e2d0d4.pdf 78a881a36e8da73bb1c9cb002a3dbf56 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-10-13 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 10/13/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/a478c6dfbb5f7c654a63eaf53ed98178.pdf af68da0364cbe582666505d21d5eff35 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-10-20 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 10/20/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/ac0c11b393d16b939e392b8ec22ef79f.pdf b76a427121a772038c35d92f4e2c4e46 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-10-27 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 10/27/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/9bc5d05fe564c8f1c458f10428f077ef.pdf b3d1f73db43724db9247b377de0fbd5a Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-11-03 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 11/3/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/01980e2196ff1890359cc46b62ff94ef.pdf ebd6888f0b38caa6f2cf161b718784f0 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-11-10 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 11/10/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/7804c58a5c7153e21864f9c33f455b38.pdf ff934b6b75ca3a62f056c44f400e8c6d Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Still Image A static visual representation. Examples include paintings, drawings, graphic designs, plans and maps. Recommended best practice is to assign the type Text to images of textual materials. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-11-24 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 11/24/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/dd1e893470c4d6c52fcf0a1fc6b4a403.pdf ed168a725efb9cc3ce42fc49839fb679 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Slip Stream Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Airbase Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-CR/1.0/ Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1943-12-01 Slip Stream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/UND/1.0/</a> Description An account of the resource Casper Army Airbase Newspaper Subject The topic of the resource Casper Army Air Base (Casper, Wyo) Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. Any newspaper published after 1925 and prior to 1964 has a strong probability of being in the public domain. To be copyright protected, a paper published between these years was required to include a printed copyright notice within the paper. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Casper Army Air Base Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 12/1/1943 https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/3c83f2a01826f313569d7bff387efec6.pdf 30865dd417c4bd22f64903ca038beeea PDF Text Text WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Dr. Lloyd Loftin Oral History Conducted July 26 2011 Interview by Teri Hedgpeth At the Western History Center Casper College Dr. Lloyd Loftin was President of Casper College. In this oral history he discusses his childhood in an oil camp, university in Illinois, service in the Air Force as a Vet-Tech, and his time at Casper College. Teri Hedgpeth: My name is Teri Hedgpeth, today is July 26, 2011. We are at the Western History Center and I will be interviewing Dr. Lloyd Loftin, former Casper College President. Dr. Loftin, where were you born? Lloyd Loftin: I was born at home, all my brothers were too. In Humble Oil Camp about 4 or 5 miles outside of Wilson, Oklahoma in Carter County. Hedgpeth: And you said Homa Oil? Loftin: Humble, Humble Oil Company. Hedgpeth: Humble Oil Company, all right, I’m sorry. Loftin: It later became Exxon. Hedgpeth: Okay. Was your father an oilman? Loftin: Yeah, Dad was a laborer. My dad lacked education but he never had much of a chance. I think he finally got through the eighth grade but he was a promoter of education I’ll say. But, yeah he did, he dug ditch, laid pipeline. Back then it was all hand done of course, and a he worked very hard. But he also, when he got home, had big gardens, so we ate well, even during the depression. But this was a large oilfield and we moved to two other large oilfields as they opened up. Dad was instrumental in getting those done. That was about it, it was a rural life. People very close. This camp probably had 28 to 30 families. Back then they also had barracks for the single employees. They furnished us everything, water, ice what have you. Natural gas they would burn it all over the place to get rid of it so we had all the natural gas we could burn in the winters. But it was quite a good place to grow up because I think it developed my interest in biological sciences, because I was wondering around asking myself questions. Why is that? Why did that happen? These kinds of things. My dad was always interested in animals. We had cows and horses, what have you so, but that was about my early years. I went to the age of five, I started elementary school and it was a little rural elementary school. 1 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Went there one year and then we were transferred, dad was transferred to Seminole, Oklahoma where they opened a new oilfield there and there was a camp there but we couldn’t get any housing there so dad had a house built just outside of the camp and we lived there for a few years. Then he was transferred to Illinois. They had opened a new field there and I remember I asked dad, I said, “Why, and I was crying, why, in the world are we going to move, I’ll lose all my friends?” you know how it is with this kind of stuff. And I said, “Why in the world are we moving?” It tickled my dad and he said “That’s where they are mailing my check.” and I understood then. But then, let me see, we moved up there, I was in – let’s see, in Seminole I went to a rural elementary school. Then, when we moved on out to, Illinois. But first of all, we moved into a little town of Cowden because we couldn’t get any housing, but I mean it was boom and housing was terribly scarce. Hedgpeth: What year was this? Loftin: This was 1939, and so dad found a remote house in a little town of Cowden, Illinois which was on the north end of the oilfield; kind of a primitive little place. We had one stove in the house and we burned anthracite coal and if you stayed right next to the stove it wasn’t too bad. But, you go anywhere else, we had a refrigerator; but, we put stuff in it to keep it from freezing. Honestly, it was cold. But, we lived there about two months and I started school there and then we moved to- had a house built there (house he mentioned earlier outside of oilfield) and we moved there and entered a school there. So, I actually went to three schools in the same year. Had an interesting, I keep saying, I couldn’t have grown up in a better place, small town, 2,000 people. It was basically German. German Lutheran, German Catholic and they were not overly receptive to what they called “The Erlers,” the people who worked in the oil field. But once they found out we weren’t going to eat ‘em up, I guess they warmed up and it was a nice place to grow up. Had a lot of good friends there and when I finished high school, and I’ll always remember, this one, we had 32 at our graduating class. Hedgpeth: What year was that? Loftin: That was in 1946. My older brother had just gotten back from WWII and was living in town and his wife and daughter, but none of my family, had ever gone to college, as far back on either side, no one ever went to college of course never graduated, and dad wanted me to go to college. Well, we didn’t know a thing about it so, college started September 2, as I remember, and we decided the weekend before, I better go up and see what was going on. This was when the GI’s were coming back after World War II and there were all over the place and it was hard to get classes, hard to get anything like in freshman because they were basic and all freshman and so the freshman classes, and the administration was out collecting anyone they thought could teach school. I decided I wanted to go into pre-med and I got an advisor, he was a PHD Chemist, never taught a day in his life, and he actually owned a string of dry good stores across Illinois. But anyway, he was not a good teacher and a terrible advisor and so at the end of the first year, which was not a happy year. I had not had chemistry in high school, so chemistry was a tough road to hoe. They put me in German and everyone in the class had been stationed in Germany. 2 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 We had one girl who was a native German and a teacher who was a native German and she said, “Oh, well good, we’ll just speak German.” I mean for a guy who had trouble with English, that thing was eating my lunch. But anyway, at the end of my freshman year, I went back to my advisor then to enroll for the sophomore year and I said “I want another advisor.” “Why?” I said, “You have no more interest in me than you do anything else around here. I want someone who looks at me as an individual, not as a number or –“He said, “Oh, you must want to see” I said, “I want to stay in the sciences”. He said, “You must want to see Dr. Stover.” I said, “Where is he?” He said, “That guy right over there, bald headed guy.” Okay, so I go over and wait; a lot of people he is working with and I told him, “I want to change my major and I want to go into Botany and he said, “Well let’s go up here and talk.” So we went up to the top of the gym, sat down and visited and he was interested in me. And I found that whole department, there were three people in the Botany department and all of them were master teachers and they had interest in each of their students as an individual and they would have us over to their house after a field trip and we would talk to the other Botany majors, about where we had been, what we did and what we saw. And so, Dr. Stover was head of the department. Dr. Thut, he was German, taught physiology, he was tough. And Dr. Damon had been chief microbiologist for the Chicago City Waterworks, and he wanted to get into teaching and so he came down there and he made an excellent, excellent teacher. In fact, he got me into microbiology quite a ways, and of course, I came here and taught it for a couple years. Hedgpeth: Was this the University of Illinois? Loftin: No, it was Eastern Illinois. It started out Eastern Illinois Teachers’ College. I think even before that it was Normal School and Teacher’s College and became a State College; it was growing very rapidly, and is now Eastern Illinois State University. Hedgpeth: And where is that located? Loftin: Charleston, Illinois. Hedgpeth: Okay. Loftin: Ah, there were five State Colleges that were teachers colleges. University of Illinois dominated higher education, somewhat like other things we know. And so they were trying to keep everything pretty well under their thumb but the GI’s coming back, schools were growing. They got some political power and then they all became State Colleges at the same time. They are all now State Universities. But, again, I couldn’t have gone to a better place. I only ran into two or three knotheads that were really not good teachers. I remember the Dean of Women, that is when they had Dean of Men and Dean of Women, she wore a suit and male type haircut, wore horned rim glasses, tall, rangy kind of old gal but very prim and proper. And we used to argue, she was a real advocate of liberal education and I told her one day, I said “If I want a liberal education, I’d 3 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 major in liberal arts. I’m interested in science and that’s all I want!” Typical knothead, but anyway. Hedgpeth: [laughs], I was going to ask you, what would you classify as a “knothead” or not a good teacher? Loftin: Well, that’s an oaky term; it’s a person that you disagree with or gives you a hard time. But she, she turned me around in my thinking somewhat. I majored in Botany and minored in Zoology, History and Education. And basically, they were still training teachers, period. But, I found that I was working very hard because of loving what I was doing. That can inspire you too want to know more, more, and more. One of the things that I found out too by taking zoology, things I had asked myself questions as I was growing up, I was finding answers and it was so satisfying to all of a sudden, a question would come back into my mind and there is the answer, and, so that inspired me as well. My dad as I said was always a gardener and I found answers to certain things that were going on in his garden that I had wondered, you know, why did this happen, or how did that take place, or what have you. But anyway, I finished my, I worked real hard. We were on a quarter system and my senior year, the whole three quarters, I had lab sciences, four lab sciences a quarter, and that was an overload but I was having fun. And so I graduated, got my bachelors June 4, 1950. And I decided that I had already decided to want to go to the University of Oklahoma and start my master’s. Two of my good buddies, we had gone to high school together, played basketball together, and we all went to college together. They both wanted to start teaching and one was a mathematician and the other was in, oh what they call it, anyway Shop types of things. Hedgpeth: Okay. Loftin: Anyway, they both went to the Chicago area. One taught Math in Evergreen Park which is a southern suburb of Chicago. The other one taught Manual Arts over, near Cicero, which is the in the Northwestern area of the Chicago area. I decided I wanted to go to the University of Oklahoma and get my Master’s, so they started teaching and I took off. And the Dean of the School of, or the Department of Botany, but he was a Dean of Science, University of Oklahoma. He was my advisor and I went in and he said “What do you want to do?” I told him and he said, “Oh, no, no.” He said, “I’ve looked over your transcript,” he said “You have more biological sciences with your Bachelor’s Degree than our Master’s people have. And I [he] said, “So, we’re going to broaden your education.” I said, “I didn’t come down here to get my education broadened.” I said, “I feel sorry for your Master’s people.” I’m sure they got a good education; but, I had concentrated on the biological sciences and I wanted more. Well anyway, he said, “Well, I am your advisor and you take what I tell you to take, or I won’t sign it.” And so, I went ahead, I was there, had paid my tuition [laughs]. And so anyway, I started the classes and one of them was scientific German, one was the history of science, I don’t remember the other two, but anyway I did meet some good people one who became a lifelong friend. He was interesting, you ought to interview him. 4 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Hedgpeth: What’s his name? Loftin: Now, you shouldn’t ask me that. Hedgpeth: Oh, I’m sorry. Loftin: Dale, shew, I’ll think of it. Hedgpeth: Okay. Loftin: But, I also met my first wife there and we dated for a while. So, it went on Christmas and I thought the Korean War was getting real hot and my two buddies that had started teaching, they drafted them out of the classroom; both of them wounded up in the army. One spent his whole time, and one of my friends was his wife, spent their two years in Alaska, near the Aleutian Islands. Paul wound up in Korea and I don’t know what he done but he wound up with the Bronze Star; but anyway, when I got home for Christmas I said, “I better see what the draft board, where I stand with the draft board.” So I go over and said, “Where am I on your list here?” They said, “You’re number one on the hit parade,” and so I went home and told the folks. My older brother, who was in the infantry, was in Patton’s third army in World War II. He said, “Don’t be a gravel grinder, infantry.” My dad had been in the Cavalry in World War I, he said “Don’t get in the army.” So, we talked it over and I enlisted in the Air Force and so I left on a Monday morning early to go to St. Louis to be sworn in and find out where I was going, and that morning at 10:00 o’clock, in the mail at my folks home, was a letter from the draft board, telling me I was being drafted. And Dad told me this on the phone, “What did you do?” He said, “I just wrote on it, whereabouts unknown.” My dad would never lie; he didn’t know where I was. Because of course I had enlisted and we went up to basic training. An awful lot of people were enlisted, taken in the air force, there were 14,000 wound up at Lackland Field the same day that I got there. All of them new enlistees, but sworn in in St. Louis; had our physical in St. Louis, and then they put us on a train to San Antone, Texas, Lackland Air Force Base. Went through basic, typical basic. Wife wants to go back to San Antone and I said “Never.” [laughs] We’ll go back; she wants to do the Riverwalk that kind of stuff. But anyway, got through basic and I, there were so many people, there having difficulty finding appropriate places to go after the basic training; and I pulled guard duty at night, guarded a swimming pool, an empty swimming pool, with a tent stake. I asked my Sergeant “Whose going to steal that thing?” He didn’t appreciate my questioning him [laughs]. Anyway, I pulled guard duty, I guarded an empty barracks; got to see guys in OCS just across, Officers Candidate School, and I decided I didn’t want to do that. But anyway, eventually a Master Sargent called me and said to go to Career Counseling. This was a new deal the Air Force had, instead of saying “you go there,” go to Career Counseling. So I go in and the old boy, he was a Master Sargent, been in 20, 25, 30 years and he was an uneducated individual and he said to me “What do you want to do?” And I said, “Well.” he said, “Wait a minute, let me look at your papers?” so he looked at it, “Oh, you’ve got a college transcript?” He said, “You’ve got a Bachelor’s Degree in Bot-tan- ny?” I said, “Yes.” 5 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 “What is that?” I said, “It’s the study of plant science.” “Hell, we ain’t got no gardens.” This is Career Counseling. So anyway, he said, “I don’t know, let me go see what schools are open.” And he was gone, pretty soon he came back. He said, “We got a truck driver school, it’s Army, in El Paso.” And he said, “We’ve got a cook school open,” I forget where it was and he said “found also, we got a weather school open Rantoul, Illinois, Air Base. I said, “Well I’ve had meteorology and climatology and what have you, and that sounds interesting to me.” He said, “Well, let me go check on it.” So he took off. And he had been gone probably 15 minutes and a Major stuck his head in the door and said “Are you Private Loftin?” I said “Yes sir.” He said, “Come with me.” I said “Well Sergeant went down to check on a school and he told me to stay right here.” He said, “I outrank him, come on.” I never saw the Sergeant again. Anyway, they were starting a school for Veterinary, in what they called Veterinary Science and I had been to school in Chicago. Army School, no wait a minute, I’m getting ahead of myself. He said “We’re starting, this and we are letting only people who have Bachelor Degrees in the Biological Sciences. And so he told me a little about what they did, it’s basically food purchase, food inspection and sanitation on bases, cooking facilities, barracks, all kinds of things where you run into animals. Also, taking care of Military animals and dependent animals. And GI’s will pick up any animal, anywhere in the world and drag it back. So anyway, I said, “Well, it sounds interesting.” “Where do you want to go, where do you want to be stationed?” And I said, “Well,” it’s a wonder I didn’t get court martialed, I said, “Well, sir it makes no difference, I won’t go there anyway,” but, I said “I would like to go to Oklahoma City, Tinker Field, Oklahoma City.” He said, “Okay, next week you’ll be there.” I said, “Oh yeah.” [laughs] I had listened to my brother too much. But anyway, the next week I was at Tinker Field, Oklahoma City. That’s some tremendous people, they were like me, they were out of college, all biological scientists, a number of them wanted to go into that school but they had to get the service out of the way first. I learned a lot about food manufacturing, processing, storage, food facilities, where you get into all kinds of problems, and mess halls and that type thing. So anyway, they said, “You gotta go to school” and so I was sent to Fifth Army Headquarters in Chicago and was, they had a, the Army had a barracks feeding facility so forth at the stock yards, in South Chicago, and that was our school. We had fifty students. They had 47 Army and 3 Air Force and all of our instructors were Veterinarians, or Veterinary Techs they called them, these were enlisted men who knew their business in certain areas, food purchase, and we’ll go there, had some interesting times there, the Air Force, what they called “brass” that’s the emblems on your hats and on your jackets and so forth used to be oxidized aluminum, no polish, well the army, that’s one of the things they like to get people on is not keeping their brass polished. So they were always on us, “You ought to polish that stuff.” We said the Air Force regulations, blah, blah, blah says, you know, “you don’t.” We [Air Force] were allowed to wear suspenders, in the Army they were not, so we bought suspenders [laughs]. But that was a tremendous school. We were at the stock yards and we saw, during that we were there twelve weeks and we saw almost everything made, stored, tested, that the military would buy. We saw, they bought mainly boneless beef, and we went through a facility that had both boneless beef and pork. We went through a facility at Armours, they were putting up 660 hogs an hour. That’s completely [de]boned and in a box and I wouldn’t want to get in a knife 6 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 fight with any of those people I saw working, man oh man. Cold, it was cold, they wear [chain]mail gloves, their knives are just like razors. But they, I mean, you just saw a hog come down through there that had already been killed, of course, all the hair taken off, eviscerated, and here comes it, I mean you can just see it disintegrate. Hedgpeth: Just an assembly line with these meat cutters? Loftin: Off comes a ham, off comes a ham for ham hocks, off comes a loin, you know, here is the ribs, here is the bacons, here is the head, you know. And you know, they had large chutes, each individual had very large chutes, and as they took off a ham, skinned it, it went down the chute. Same with the bacons, I mean they didn’t box them at the chutes, they were boxed later. They had a machine, this was on the sheep, and the sheep were Kosher killed. They had a rabbi and he did the slaughter. They would herd those sheep, who are not the brightest animal in the world, into a corner would be a loop that would grab them the leg and up they’d go, someone would slit their throat and they would be bleeding on the way, and then they would just take them apart. So we saw all kind of things like that. We went to the largest dairy in the United States. They were still using glass bottles. We started where the old dirty bottles came in and there was everything in those bottles you could possibly think of, mice, trash, cigarette butts, you know everything you could think of and they would go through the cleaning process. Then it shows the pasteurization of the bottling. That was fascinating. We went to a chicken plant in Iowa, where they were putting up canned chickens for the military and, that was interesting, to see the feathers taken off. They had them hanging up, they used an electric knife and they would grab the head and with the electric knife, they would hit them in the throat to cut it but it would also electrocute them, or stunned them. Then they went down through a vat of hot water, this was an assembly line process. They would come up on the other side and they go through a deal, a lot of soft rubber fingers, spinning, and it would just clean the feathers off it, off that bird completely and then they would go in and kind of wash it again and eviscerated. And all during this time, at certain points like when they were eviscerated there was a Veterinarian and he was checking all the eviscerous [eviscerated chickens] to see if there were any diseases, any sign of diseases, also checked the outside of the carcasses for skin cancer, that type of thing, if it on a wing they would cut the wing off, throw it away. Until they went into a room and they were cooked, came out, they stuffed them in a can, put on a lid and that’s that. Never had chicken much since. Hedgpeth: How long was that process? I mean time wise, from the time that theyLoftin: Oh, until it was killed and until it was in the can? Well, they cooked them in the can anyway, probably eight, ten minutes from one end to the other, and the chickens were probably no more than 18 inches apart. That was a Kraft, of course, Kraft was the big cheese, that doesn’t sound right, the big cheese. Hedgpeth: But they were- 7 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Loftin: Their largest plant, both manufacturing and storage, was in Chicago and we got an enlightenment going through that plant. I love cheese, but some of the cheese was manufactured in Wisconsin, maybe independents, putting up cheese, we got what they called wheels which were about 32 pound wheels and they were already covered with the cheese cloths and then wax. But you get a little instrument, which is half a cylinder and a pointed end, and you run that down in the cheese then pull it out and you’ve got a plug, and you take a bit of that, just take it off and put it on your tongue, roll it around a little bit, you get the taste, spit it out, put the plug back in and then you go to the next one. Well they always had one out where the old cow had been eating wild onions and boy [chuckles] that would do it. The interesting thing is that all of these sort of these rejected cheeses, those that the Army or the Military didn’t want and commercial outfits didn’t want them because of the taste, they skin all the wax and stuff off, put in a big vat and melt it down and this would become processed cheese, and they would put them out in little boxes. Hedgpeth: No more cheese slices for me! Loftin: It is still good cheese, it’s just that the flavor is not quite what they want and you blend it all together, you know; makes no difference. But all kinds of schools, I mean plants, ice cream, anything that the military going to buy, we got to go to their plant. And we were tested, I remember we came out after we had been over to a beef slaughter, the boning, we go in and here is a refrigerated table with all the pieces of a cow, boneless, sitting there. So we each had a piece of paper and pencil and we had to go through and identify them all. Well, I had animal anatomy so this really wasn’t much of a chore but some of those poor guys, I said look at that doesn’t even look like meat [laughs]. Anyway, we there 12 weeks and we graduated and it wasn’t tough at all. You know, we had guys in there, high school graduates and but I graduated first in the class and another guy in the Air Force graduated second and the other one [third Air Force personal] graduated third, but of course we all had bachelor degrees in the life sciences. So anyway, I got back to Tinker’s field, I was married by then, and doing my regular duties, things would come in and get eggs by the carloads. There weren’t many military on Tinker’s Field because it was one of the Air Material Commands Centers for refurbishing used jet engines and there were thirty some thousand civilians but they all ate on base, at least one meal. And it was a twenty-four operation so there were a lot of food went through there but we would get eggs by the semi-load and they had taught us a statistical way to approach a train load of eggs, how to inspect them. Which ones to select and what have you. So that was always interesting to candle those eggs and make a determination, I was a Corporal by then, so I made, the wife and I together, probably made $125.00 a month and a car load of eggs would be kind of expensive to try to pay off. But we could also get refrigerated trucks, semis full of beef, sides of beef, both hind and forequarters and we were to inspect those. They come in with milk by the, this was all milk and dairy products, come in – a carload of that and we would take samples. The vendor was on Federal contract and they were actually out of Oklahoma City, but we would take samples to make sure that what they were contracted to do, they were actually doing. So we would run butterfat contents and pasteurization and all that type of stuff and that was interesting 8 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 in that a small dairy in Oklahoma City wanted a contract bad so they came in with a pretty low bid. Well we had to inspect each plant and a buddy of mine and I went to Oklahoma City, to inspect the facility, we inspect them once a week and we found for instance some of their piping when you heat milk, the organic chemicals in milk will tend to bake on to the lining, that’s all stainless steel stuff, but it will bake on the linings so you have to go swab those out. It is called milkstone and we found milk stone, we found this that and the other and we were going to write them up and give them a copy, so they would know what was going on, go back out and turn in your reports to the staff. And I inspected the plant, I think maybe five times in five weeks and finally, they said they were not doing what they were contracted to do. We found some e-coli in some of the samples that we would run, so they took the contract away from them. and that was a bad deal for them because the Federal regulations said on this contract that if they cannot meet their contract they will, the government, will release them from supplying but they will then go to another supplier, they must pay the difference between from what they were contracted to receive and what they are charging and they were bankrupt within a short period of time because we would get in one day we would probably get four or five refrigerator trucks full of dairy products so they didn’t last very long after that. But, I got a letter from the Command Veterinarian at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. He was the big cheese in the veterinarian he was Bird Colonel (slang for Full Colonel, above lieutenant colonel below Brigadier General source: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/colonel.) A nice letter, he said “I am wondering whether,” he said “we are starting this new school in Alabama for veterinary techs and I am wondering if whether or not you would like to become an instructor.” Well I kinda stuck it in my pocket and oh two weeks later my commanding officer, Major, said “Did you get a letter from the Commanding Veterinarian”? I said “Yeah”. “What did it say”? I said, “Well they are starting that school down there and he kinda wondered if I would kind like to go down there”. He said, “You accepted that as sort of a, are you interested?” I said, “Yes, sir”. He said, “That’s not what it says, what is says is you are going. You write him a letter and tell him you couldn’t wait to get out of here”. So anyway I wrote him a letter and said I would be glad to go but I got orders to go then about oh, within a week and a half, and wife and I drove down. It was a brand new school. I think they had only run maybe two classes through so far. And the base itself was a school of Aviation Medicine, Junior, they called it. The school of Aviation Medicine was really at Kelly Field at San Antonio but that was mainly for like physicians and flight surgeons and that type of stuff. Hedgpeth: Was this Maxwell Airforce Base? Loftin: No this was not Maxwell but Gunner, Hedgpeth: Oh Gunner. Loftin: Completely across town so from Maxwell. And we had guys who had come in the Air Force out of the Army and had been Veterinary Techs in the army. Interesting group of people and most of them were Master and Tech Sergeants. At that time I was Buck Sergeant, three striper and they were having problems, the Air Force schools had a testing service where they 9 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 used the, everything had to be multiple choice and had the regular sheets where you just marked a little hash mark and these were sent, machine graded and analyzed and then sent back to, every question was analyzed, as to who passed it who flunked it, which answers did they give, right or wrong, you know, they were like “oh it was sent back.” Well I was the only one that had any training in education, I mean, the discipline of education so I wound up going over all those questions when they came back. We had eight or nine instructors, four of them officers, all Veterinarians, and the rest Veterinarian Techs. When we get back these things, we’d look and see “here is a question that not many people answered right.” We would analyze, or I did, and I would then re-write those questions and then we would try them again. So I did that and our courses were eight weeks long and part of my job was to, before the students got there, to give an hour by hour course instructor equipment in audio visual, that kind of stuff. We went eight hours a day for eight weeks until they got that whole program on a chart and we just had to think where we slipped them in, just a little slip of paper with all this information on it and you get things done, and that is out of sequence, “where does this go?” you know. And it run you crazy trying to make sure you covered everything, all the instructors, you know, where being utilized in their area, and so forth, so that was one of my jobs. We would get veterinarians, actually we had veterinarians come through, we had, these were new people, never been in the service before. They were drafted basically, flight surgeons, nurses, what have you. None of them had ever been in the military before. Well one of my jobs was to take the veterinary officers and tell them how to dress. They had no idea, when they were notified they were being drafted in, all these clothing equipment companies would get lists and they sent them all this information about uniforms, so they would buy them while they were home. They would come down there, they were terrible, comic, but anyway I had to show them how to dress and why. Where all the insignias, and what have you, how to salute and who to salute, you know. It was fun. [laughs] I remember we had a flight surgeons come through one time and I don’t know why I wound up teaching the refrigeration. Of course, flight surgeon in charge of the hospital, they are the number one officer in the hospital but I had to teach them refrigeration, but anyway I noticed every flight surgeon I saw come through there had very large hands and I asked one day, I said “You know you go to the movies and you see this, you know this flight surgeon, his hands are like a pianists you know, I said, “You guys look like hams”. He said, “Well let me put it this way, I probably pinch off more tissue than I cut”. Hedgpeth: Yeah. Loftin: They do, you know and seeing like that and it’s safer, to get a scalpel in there. Anyway I’m getting off the subject. I was there two, well almost three years, and had some interesting times. The old man called me in, Colonel Hubbard, the head Veterinarian. I had about a year to go, maybe 14 months to go, before I got a discharge and he said “Loftin, are you going to re-enlist”? and I said “No sir”. He said, “You’ll never get another stripe”. Well I had made up my mind when I had enlisted that I wanted to get out as a Master Sergeant, all six stripes. I had all the qualifications in my MOS with an 8 0, so that is what it took to qualify. He said “You’re not going to get anymore”. And I didn’t. 10 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Hedgpeth: Well were you a Tech Sgt. by then or. Loftin: Staff Hedgpeth: Staff, okay Loftin: And a so, anyway, I had made up my mind I wanted to get my Master’s when I got out, I wasn’t going back to OU. But, my wife had attended OU and she said it was one of the finest schools. People were friendly, helpful, kind, considerate, all the other type of things, so I applied and I was accepted before I got out and woops [Tape recorder clicks stop] Hedgpeth: Perfect stop, perfect. We’ll just switch this over, would you like some water or anything since wereLoftin: Well if you have some around, sounds pretty good. I’m getting a little dry. Hedgpeth: Let me go ahead. Loftin: Am I giving you what you want? Hedgpeth: You’re doing great, I’m going sto[Audio file part one stops] Hedgpeth: Okay, you were talking about going to OSU, Loftin: Yeah, we packed up our, the air force moved us, we didn’t have anything. The air force moved us up and the wife had a distant relative that worked in the library at OSU and they had finagled us some housing. The married student housing per se was full, new stuff, but they had some old World War II barracks, they were full, but there was one Quonset hut, it was a double, it looked like a tent made out of ply wood and two of these were put together and that was the only one left and we got it. It had not been used in years and I go out to see what we need and where they could put the furniture. The door was open and a dog had gone in and done his duty in the kitchen, there were no appliances. Well there was a gas stove. It was heated by two open flame gas stoves one at each end and the wife was not overly happy with this but I said, we gotta live somewhere, I’m enrolled so suck it up. But anyway we had two kids with us, both were born at Maxwell Field and so I got some fencing, built a fence around the place so we could keep them in one place. But anyway, I go down, I had decided, I wanted, if you’re going to make any money, and I had been doing administrative stuff at school of Aviation Medicine so I decided to get my masters in school administration. So I enrolled, like most GI’s coming back, was scared to death, figured, I’m this old guy, these kids are going to plow me under. But that was not the 11 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 case. I met several very good people, my adviser, I don’t know how this works out but the Dean of School Education wound up as my adviser and Elmer Sorrenson, he was a good one though. And Dr. Richardson taught administration. It was a good place. Dr. Richardson was an interesting little guy. His real major interest in life was the meaning of words and their origin. I worked in his office that was one way I made a living was working in the office. The other one was that I opened the library at 7:00 o’clock in the morning and all I did was open one door, people could come in and go but I checked all the baggage’s that came in and as they left and I made 75¢ an hour. So I worked two hours there and made a buck and a half but that was a big buck and a half, but, I found that although I got my Master’s in school administration, was not satisfied. When I got my degree, I was offered a job as principal of a junior high school in a town pretty close to Stillwater. But a junior high, compared to me, would be the last place in the world that you would want to work. I really wanted to teach. So I made application, I wanted to stay in Oklahoma, since I was an “Okie”, I applied for only four teaching jobs. One at Ardmore, which is close to where I was born in Enid, which had a real good school system. Bartlesville which had an excellent school system and Ponca City which is in the northern part of the state, was the only independent school district in Oklahoma at that time, in other words, they could finance their own and they were not on State Aid, they were under State control. I don’t know why, I never did hear from Ardmore, Enid or Bartlesville but I got a letter from Ponca City, said they had an opening and would like to interview. So I drive up and went, I go up to the principal’s office, Mr. Anderson, who by the way was probably one of the finest administrators I ever worked under. He was kind and considerate but also very demanding. He’d do it the right way. He visited with me awhile, probably a couple hours, got to be noon, he said I’ve got to go to Rotary Club so I’m going to take you down to the cafeteria, you can get lunch, he said, “I’ll tell them not to charge you”, and you can go into faculty lounge and you can meet people in the faculty lounge and have your lunch. So, he takes me down, introduces me to the head cook, who became a good friend of mine, but anyway, he said, go through the line, there is coffee there and so forth, and visit with people. I go through the line, go in the teacher’s lounge. I am a little apprehensive, here is all these educated people, so I sat my plate down, go over to get a cup of coffee. Now I was still wearing air force shoes, air force shirt, air force tie, air force pants, but I did have another coat and a different tie, but anyway, I go over to get a cup of and a guy saddles up besides me and he says, where did you get that outfit anyway, the glass house, which was a place where people go to pick up used clothing and I looked at this guy, but anyway, he was standing beside me and we got to visiting. We became fast friends and it was Sinclair Orendorff [spelling] who wound up president. While he was here, as Dean of Students and he went from here to Powell as President. We became fast friends, he taught physics and math, was also, they allowed each school to have someone to take care of the books where miscellaneous money, student funds and those kind of things. The person I took the place of, a woman, she couldn’t have received any higher laurels from anywhere, she must have been a crackerjack teacher. That scared me. We had one other biology teacher. Bob Ingersoll, he is probably one of the few Master teachers I would have had the privilege of working with. He was a Master teacher. He taught me an awful lot about teaching, but anyway we got started and I was in an old room in which they had six seats. They were cast iron bottoms, cast iron legs on the desk, all fixed, the seats willowed and the top lifted for storage, well no one probably, since they were installed, 12 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 ever decided to lubricate the seats where they spun and they would squeak. Well you can get the picture. Someone wanted to twist, they would twist and they would squeak, squeak, squeak. So I had the superintendent’s daughter in my class, spoiled brat, she liked to squeak those things, well anyway, one Saturday I got some oil, pulled all those seats out and oiled them and put them back in. Well she happened to get a little oil on her skirt. I thought I had them cleaned but anyway, I got a visit from the superintendent, he comes up and wanted to know what’s going on, where did that oil come from. So I explained it all to him. Well he wasn’t happy but he could understand why I had done. I had an interesting year trying to decide what in those books, the State furnished the books, the State selected the books, to decide what in there I wanted to make sure I covered in what sequence and what have you. So anyway, I think I had a pretty good year. Bob helped me very much. He had been teaching, probably by then, about 10 years. He was a World War II veteran. We both had work rooms behind, prep rooms, and got to where all the sciences teachers wound up in the back of Bob’s room after school and we would do all kinds of discussions on science, life and teaching. I might add that I signed a contract for $3400 for nine months. They paid me $100 extra on my contract, a $100 extra because I was head of household. Hedgpeth: What is thaLoftin: Of family. Hedgpeth: Oh, I got gotcha. Loftin: They didn’t do that for women. I had a good friend that taught English, she was a single mother and I said, this is sorta an odd deal, I told her and she said “Well they don’t do that for women.” But $100, you know doesn’t sound like much but at the time it bought a lot of groceries, but by then I had, my daughter was born, third child, and so I go back to OSU during the summer. First of all, I had not sent to out of state in Oklahoma to get your teaching certificate. All teachers had to have credit in Oklahoma history. Well I was born in Oklahoma. But I had to go take a course, well I decided to take by correspondence. But I then went to OSU, I had to take this teacher’s certification came from the Universities. Not from a State office, which counts for, at the State Universities and State Colleges so I go visit this guy and tell him I’ve gotta get my, I had a temporary, had to get a permanent certificate. So he goes over everything and he says, “You need to take physics.” “Physics”? I had, I don’t know how I wound up with one course in physics on my Bachelor’s, “You know you got have physics”? I didn’t know I had one quarter of physics. I said, “Well why would I want to do that”? “Well you may want to teach it”. I said, “You telling me you let people, you certify people to teach physics with only one year of physics”? “Well these smaller schools, you know, it works out”. Well anyway, I took two semesters of physics that summer and was getting my Oklahoma History out of the way, but anyway I decided that I was going to get my Doctorate in the School of Administration, so I started that program every summer. It got to be that I would teach nine months, I would go to OSU for 2-1/2 months and then grab the family and go to Rocky Mountain National Park for vacation and then come back and start teaching again. That went on for quite a while. 13 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Hedgpeth: When did you start teaching, what year was that and how long. Loftin: Let’s see that was in nineteen ----started teaching in ‘55, September of ’55. Anyway about the third summer, I was taking courses that I had to take a course in, there was exact time limit, basically, song and dance for elementary students. Here I was in this class with kindergarten teachers, elementary teachers and I hate dancing, I’m a Southern Baptist and dancing is a sin and I’m not supposed to do that. I am uncoordinated anyway, well, when I finished that class, I decided this is not for me. So I talked to my Ed. advisor, I said, you know this is not satisfying. If I’m going to do this, I want to take what I want and that’s the sciences, so I said, “you have any recommendations for an advisor in zoology?” He said, “Yes, Dr. Jones Head of Zoo. So I go over to talk to him. He was an interesting guy. He had taught elementary school, Jr. High, High, Jr. College, Senior College and University. So, he had been all over the place but he had common sense, he had been there. I told him I wanted to change major and I wanted to go into zoology and I’d like to have him as my advisor. Well he was also the advisor of my good friend, who was teaching with me at Ponca City. Bob was doing his Master’s and had started his PHD, so Dr. Jones said, “yeah, okay,” he said, “pick a committee and get one from education. Well I picked Genesis and of course Dr. Jones was a geneticist and another guy was a physiologist and a guy from education, who was basically, taught curriculum so Dr. Jones says, “I want you to meet the committee.” So he got them together in a couple weeks, I go in, he said “I want you to tell this committee what you want to do eventually, what’s your ultimate goal.” I said, “I would like to teach in a small college.” [Dr. Jones speaking] “Okay, go outside”. So I went outside and I hear them in there, Yabba, Yabba, Yabba. Pretty soon, I guess it was probably an hour, I come back in, he hands me a sheet of paper and said, “That’s what you are going to take.” So I look it over, it looked pretty good. I said, “You got Philosophy down here, do I have to take that?” [Dr. Jones] “Yeah.” I said, “What if I don’t want to and I won’t sign it?” That sounded familiar, he said “I want you to get under this instructor, he is tremendous.” Well anyway I started with the program and I could only go into science and a so I got about two summers under my belt. And so this geneticist was a real character. He was kinda like Wally Cox, only without glasses and very bright. He had study genetics under Theodoris Doubansaci [spelling?] at that time, he was at the University of Texas. He was the world’s authority in Drosophila genetics. Drosophila is a little fruit fly. And he comes from, got his PHD under Doubansaci [?] and they came to OSU. I’m getting way ahead of myself, but anyway when, I’ll just throw this in example since I am talking about him. I met with the committee and went over my thesis and they wanted, by that time the curriculum guy had retired and was off my committee and I picked up Dr. Jones’ given PHD over so I did, “big drama.” He said “It will help him, he has got to have a committee work and he will learn something and he may have some new ideas.” So anyway, we were meeting with that committee and this guy had that “I suffered and you’re going to too.” And he was asking all kind of questions about all the problems that I gonna serve, this that and another and he said, “Why do you want a Doctorate?” I kind of fumbled around, I guess I satisfied him, 14 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 anyway we headed back to the old building and I was walking with this Geneticist and he said “You missed a perfect opportunity here to give him a correct answer to that question “Why do you want a Doctorate?” And I said, “Well what should I have said?” He said, “Get out of here.” [laughs] I said, “I am not sure he would have expected it” But, they had me written down for a good array of courses. One of the toughest I took was Comparative Animal Physiology. This was physiology of all animals. One of the most fascinating courses, one of the most helpful courses I’ve had. When you join- when you get into where a river is running into the ocean, you have all these different environments. How do they cope? Who copes? That’s just one example but course that matters. I had a course in Ecology from an interesting fellow. He was not liked because he had more research events than all the rest of them put together. They had dammed the Arkansas River, just outside of Tulsa, and they built it so they would unload from the bottom, not over the top, so they were getting all the bottom sediments. One of the big tributaries outside of Tulsa, to the Arkansas River is the Salt River, well salt water does not mix easily with fresh water, and it’s heavy, it would settle out in the bottom. So you had all this organic material coming down, settling out in this layer of salt water and aerobic bacteria would go to work on it and you would wind up with an awful lot of sulfursulfur gas. When they bottom loaded it, I’m getting into things I’m sure you’re not interested in at all but, large big houses were being built along the river by the dam. There was going to be a big lake behind it and so forth. Well when they dumped that water, it smelled like rotten eggs. That created a problem. You don’t tear down a dam and start over. Well anyway, he had a lot of research money and people were very jealous of him and he became terribly independent. Of course Research and Development loved it because he was bringing in a lot of money for them too. But his course was extremely interesting. It was basically all lab and field trips. I had a question one time, it is interesting, I usually I had an assistant [to the Ecology Professor] I had in class in high school (that he had taught?) And he [the assistant] had his masters and start for Doctorate. And I said, “I need to see old Doc.” [Assistant] “Well he’s not here right now.” I said, “Here’s my question for him.” [Assistant] “No, you’re going to have to ask him.” I said, “When will he be back”? [Assistant] “Well”, he said, “I hate to tell you this, but he goes home every afternoon and watches Batman and Robin”. But pretty soon he shows up and I ask my question, it’s satisfied. But he was a character, he was a real character, but he was a teacher and a darned good researcher. The philosophy [course], the guy that taught it, PHD, he was a Presbyterian Minister. PHD in Philosophy. He looked like Ichabod Crane. Real thick glasses, tall, gangly, didn’t know how to dress properly. Had an interesting voice, sort of a deep, guttural type voice. He had ways of teaching that helped me. He was so fascinating and I loved that so much that after I finished that course, I enrolled in the next one. Hedgpeth: And this is the philosophy, you were like, “I’m not taking this.” 15 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Loftin: Yeah “I don’t want this stuff.” I remember he was talking about doing things because you know what you are doing, you understand it, the principal behind it, and doing things because they work. He said, “Picture yourself in this old medieval castle. They see the Celts coming, and so they prepare. Their boiling oil, getting oil up there, gathering big rocks, getting their weapons all sharpened and what have you.” And he said “Here they come with their ladders, they put these ladders up there,” said, “a guy picks up this rock, drops it on a guys head.” He said “He didn’t understand anything about gravity.” I mean zap. Hedgpeth: No, but they knew it worked. Loftin: It worked but they didn’t understand gravity. But – he had those kind of illustrations for various philosophical tenets that he wanted to really stick. We did a lot in educational philosophy. Reden and Riot [?] and the Catholic philosophers. Various branches of educational philosophy and we covered. Very fascinating. But the program was pretty tough because I was trying to get that done, I was trying to teach, I was trying to raise a family, make a living. So I went through with the same tooth. While I was teaching in high school up there, I was head of the science department, Bob left to go get his Doctorate and they hired a young woman who had her master’s in Zoo [Zoology] and we also had a woman who had been there for years and she was an English teacher, but she was teaching biology. She got all the kids who weren’t going to do anything anyway basically. And she helped them, I mean, wasn’t so much biology as it was life. But anyway, I was called to the principal’s office, another phone call, another phone call and the principal says the Board of Trustees are meeting tonight and they would like you to be there. And I said to Mr. Anderson, I said “This doesn’t sound good.” He said, “Just give them the way you feel about her.” Well the board, there were two John Burchers on the board, one was a physician and one worked in the oil patch somewhere and the chairman of the board was an undertaker, a very respected man in the community, been on the board for a hundred years, so they physician said, “I would like to conduct the meeting.” The president of the board said, “Okay.” I had noticed that there were three other visitors, one was a physician, one was a minister and one was a psychiatrist. This physician, the one doing the interrogating, pulled out some papers and said, “We’re upset with the way you are teaching sex, human reproduction.” I said, “Well, what are you upset about?” I said, “The film we use is a, no humans in it, it is an illustration, cartoon type thing, has been used for 17 years, no complaints from parents or anything else up to this point.” Well he said, “Here is a sheet of terms.” On it one of the terms was incest. Now this young woman, that was on her list, not mine, but I was responsible for it. And I said, “Well sir, it does occur and we don’t dwell on it, but we think these young people should know about incest and what it is and so forth.” He didn’t like it. He said, well we went on to various other things he didn’t like and he said, “It’s my feeling that when we get to this touchy subject that these students should make an appointment with their physician and he can explain it to them.” He said, “isn’t that right,” he was talking to the physician, the other doctor that was visiting, “Isn’t that right?” He had to be my family physician, and he said, “Well I don’t know what your case load looks like but I don’t have time for this.” And he said, “Number two, these people are trained to teach these things, you and I aren’t.” 16 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 So he [physician on the board] goes on, he says, “You know this is warping these people’s minds, I mean, all this stuff, they are hearing all this stuff, and it is warping their mind and it is giving them bad thoughts.” And he said, “isn’t that right?” talking to the psychiatrist. The psychiatrist said “Where they get warped is when they are hearing this stuff out behind the barn, not what they are getting out of the classroom.” So he goes on he gets into the morality of the whole thing, this just touches on immorality. So he asks the Presbyterian minister, Doctorate in Theology, largest church in Ponca City. I had both of his kids in school, he said, “Well let me put it this way, if you do away with this, my parishioners will demand that it be taught in our church by him.” So that was the end of the inquest and I go home, it was near the end of the year, and I knew those guys weren’t going to give up. And teaching was not going to be fun anymore. I talked to the wife and said, “I’m going to apply for a job, I’m getting out of here.” She didn’t want to go. Her parents lived southern Oklahoma and she was very attached to her family but I said, “I’ve got to get out of here.” So I started making application. The principal comes over, I’m cleaning up the classroom after that, near the end of the school year so Mr. Anderson comes over and he says “Lloyd, I want to nominate you as Science Teacher of the year, in the state of Oklahoma. Do you mind”? I said, “Mr. Anderson, if you are going to write a letter, write me a letter of recommendation.” He said, “That’s what I figured.” I said, “I give up, I can’t take it.” He said, “I know, okay.” So I had been to the place that had office at OSU and there was a teaching job in Zoology at Ft. Lewis A & M, in southern Colorado, and I had written them and gotten some stuff they wanted to know about me and I was looking for letters of recommendation. Well Sinclair Orendorff who had taught physics and math at Ponca City High School, was here [Casper College] as Dean of Students. Now I may back up and say that at Ponca City High School, before I got there was Tim Aley. He taught History and Drama. Tim had a chance to go to University of Kansas and do his Doctorate so he takes off [from Ponca City High School]. (Loftin backs up further to clarify) Now he and Sinclair were roommates slept in the same bed at a little school in Kansas, can’t think of it. They married two girls that were good friends. Tim gets a job teaching in Ponca City, and the next year Sinclair gets a job teaching at Ponca City High School. Then Tim gets this chance to do his Doctorate in Kansas so he takes off to do that. I come in to Ponca City High School. Then Sinclair leaves there to start his Doctorate and Tim was in Colorado in a college as assistant to the President and when they decided, he’d be the president here, they had been Dean’s up to that point, to be president. They interviewed Tim and hired him. Sinclair was working on his doctorate, Tim wants some help and so he calls Sinclair and said, “I want you to come here as Dean of Students.” Sinclair says, “I’ll never get my Doctorate”. He said, “I’ll make sure you get time off later, come help me.” So Sinclair comes. So, I’m looking for a letter of recommendation and I’ve heard he has come here so I thought, “Well, Dean of Students would look pretty good on a letter of resume.” So, I wrote Sinclair and I said, “Sinclair, I’m going to apply for this job; I’m leaving Ponca High School. I want to apply for this job at Ft. Lewis A&M. Would you write me a letter of recommendation?” I waited and waited and pretty soon, here comes a little envelope, two sheets of note paper, line 17 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 note paper, starts out “Dear Lloyd, I understand that you are applying for this job at Ft. Lewis A. & M, and he goes on and he gets to the bottom of the sheet and it says, “Hell no”. Here was my good buddy turning me down on something, I flipped it over and it says, “We’ve got an opening contract under separate cover.” [laughs] Ahh Shoot. So anyway, I get a contract to come here so I don’t have to apply anywhere. Never been in Wyoming in my life. Hedgpeth: How old are you at this time? Loftin: Let’s see how old was I? That was in what, ’63. So, let’s see, I’ll have to do my math here, that would have been 33. So I come here [Casper College] and I was to teach zoology and microbiology. I’m in summer school and Tim told him, “Make sure he takes a refresher course in Microbiology.” So I did, so I come out in the old science building, Saunder’s science, and first class I’m at, was college in freshman and he was in it. In Mike auditorium, 128 people in there. So we take off on that and I have in Microbiology, I have three nurses, three nursing students. That’s all. Now they didn’t have an incubator, they had a sterilizer but didn’t have an incubator. Didn’t have much of anything. So I go down to Sears Roebuck and ask them if they have any old or used refrigerator that they want to get rid of and they said “Yeah, but you’ll have to haul it off,” so I did. Took out the motor and compressor and everything and threw that away. Also went and got a thermostat for a chicken incubator for where they raise little and hatch them. So I hook that up inside where the light bulb and that was my incubator. And it worked, worked pretty well. Three nursing students, they were good students. This was under the old UW, what did they call it, three one plan or whatever it was, they went two or three years, two years I guess, and one year at the university. The Two One Plan. They had to finish at the University. When I had my heart surgery, I was going down the elevator one day and a nurse got on, “oh Dr. Lofin, how are you doing?” It was one of those gals that I had in that first class at Casper. One of the things that happened, we were in class, lecture class of course they put three of us, I mean four of us in there, and we heard all kinds of noise, and a kid who I had in class opened the door, came in and said, “They just shot the President.” It was the assassination of Kennedy. Said “he was in the hospital, may live, may not”, and he took off. I said “Ladies, class dismissed, we are going to war.” So we all made a head for TV. Those girls did very well. I hadn’t taught microbiology before and they took their State Boards the next year and I saw one of them and I said, “How were the Boards?” “Tough, they were tough,” She said, “All three of us agreed the easiest part of it was microbiology.” So I felt pretty good about that. These classes, we were growing rapidly, very rapidly. I had at least two classes at Mike Auditorium, it was full. And then the lab would only hold twenty or thirty I think, so Sinclair said “We gotta have more lab space.” And I said, “Well there are more hours in the day.” And he said, “Would you take additional lab?” I said “Sure,” I said, “I think I’m stealing now.” When I taught in high school, I was teaching six hours a day, thirty five students to a class, five days a week. I said, “Here I teach, Monday, Wednesday and Friday,” and I said, “What’s the matter with Tuesday and Thursday?” We added labs, what have you. I didn’t see anything wrong with it, they were amazed. Not used to working, you know, sitting around bothering me. But anyway, we made it through that year pretty good. Not Paul. I knew Paul wasn’t going to be a zoologist but he was a 18 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 good student, and a gentleman. He was custodian over here at Admin Building. He was Paul, then and now. Well anyway we finished that first year and getting ready for the second year. They hired me to help with enrollment during the summer and getting ready for the second year, Tim said “Well FEDS were just coming in to Scholarships and/or Loans and that type thing, and Federal Money, and scholarships were picking up, and Tim said, this was early “I want you to come in and straighten out the scholarship program, make applications for Federal Money, this type of stuff and I said “Well that is pretty busy,” and he said “We’ll hire a zoologist, you keep teaching micro and we’ll hire somebody to take care of the zoology.” So that is how I got into the administrative bit and the scholarships stuff was a mess. The registrar was a sweet little old woman but she wasn’t overly organized. She took care of student records fine but when it came to scholarships, she would issue them whether anyone paid money to do it or not, you know. So I got that kinda straightened out and Sinclair, this was the third year that Sinclair said “I’m going to get my Doctorate I am going to do the course work.” Tim said, “We’ll work it out.” So he called me in and said “We’re going to make you Dean of Students while Sinclair goes and gets his Coursework.” I said “Tim, we’re going to do that but I am also in my Doctor program. I will then want some time off to go get my residency and what have you.” [Tim] “Okay.” So I became Dean of Students. Marie Stewart was the Assistant Dean, good woman. And that was a new experience, being Dean of Students. I had a good friend that was Dean of Students sometime later then, Brakey, and I said he had taught physics and I said, “How is this working out”, he said, “Well you know, when I was teaching physics, I thought students magically appeared about 10:00 Monday morning and they vanished about 2:00 in the afternoon and then Friday they completely vanished.” And he said, “They are just waking up on Friday, they are just getting warmed up, which was a good way to explain it.” We had our faculty, we needed more people, we were having so many problems, but students, we would have dances every Saturday night in then the cafeteria in the old administration building. And at the beginning of the year faculty were assigned a certain weekend to work wherever student activities were taking place. It was just a part of their job. The Dean of Students was at everything. Hedgpeth: Okay we’ve hit tape one. Loftin: Do you want to give up on this. Hedgpeth: I’ve got another tape, but I see Miss Jackie Ellis out there. Do you want to take just a little bit of a break. We are in your Dean of Students right now. Loftin: Well whatever, it is up to you. Hedgpeth: Or we could continue on. I just needLoftin: ---my wife says I talk too much anyway Hedgpeth: You know what; I wish I had more people open up. Sometimes it’s like pulling teeth, yes sir, you are just flowing, I don’t have to ask any of my questions, growing up, and you’ve told me. I mean I haven’t had to ask you anything, what prompted you to become a scientist, or a life science teacher, or why Casper College, described your career progression. You’re do it. I don’t have to ask you anything, I mean here I am a Dean of Students. We’re doing 19 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 good. Yes sir, wonderful. And the questions I really have on the second page are mostly topical questions about your presidency, so I’ll wait and see when we come to that. Tape one side one. Works better if I do it right now so I don’t get them confused. And I’ll- I am just go ahead and turn this off this really quickly. [Audio file part two stops] Hedgpeth: There we go on that, all right Dr. Loftin, you were talking about your position as Dean of Students. Loftin: We didn’t have any dormitories, which made life doubly interesting for Dean of Students. Tim, since we had so many students being housed out in the community, he felt a bit of responsibility to control student activities, or attitudes or actions, even though they were in a commercial or private situation. Lot of people took kids in, private homes. They would eat up here, we had a cafeteria, they could eat up here but as far as sleeping and studying facilities, we didn’t have a library. The old, where the business office just was, was the library where, who’s over there now? Social studies, I think. I don’t know what you call them anymore but that was the old cafeteria. When I got here, the administration building was “U” shaped building, the east end; two story of the east end was not there. The Saunders science was about like it was then. The Mike Auditorium and the art deal had just been put on the end of that building and the old auto shop was, it’s down now, but it was just south of the Saunders’s Science. The entrance to the College, well where the street coming into the College from the East was a large drainage ditch, about oh probably about 18-20 feet wide and 10-12 feet deep, open. Had reeds, tumbleweeds and everything. The auto shop, set right on the edge of that thing. It curved around there and goes right down between Bailey and Morad Halls, that roadway is actually sitting on a drainage vehicle. We put large flagstone to cover them up. We, as Dean of Students, we had to or Tim wanted us to, make sure that everything was going well in the community between the Students who were living off campus and that took quite a bit of time and I said, dances, other activities, plays. The part of their job was to help chaperone students at various activities. I was Dean of Students, we actually kinda went into an old pattern, I took care of the boys and Marie Stewart took care of the girls pretty well. I got to know the policeman, the police department by first name and we started a law enforcement program so they were all up here in shifts and we got to know them up here as well as I knew them down there. Tim told me, “Sinclair has taken a job at Powell as President.” Well I said, “Okay, now what do we do?” He promised me I could finish my course work and he said, “well starting the summers, let’s start this summer and we see how it works.” So every summer I would take off and go to Stillwater with the family and do my course work, come back and they would absorb my job during the summer, at least a couple of months. But, as we progressed out of that, Tim had a good friend, he had been in the service with, a [Art] Trinum. And Art was in Germany, with his wife, still in the military and Tim wanted me to become Dean of Faculty and he wanted someone to take over as Dean of Students so he called Art Trinum in Germany and said, “We’ve got this opening and you are ready for retirement, why don’t you come work for us?” Art said, “I’ll tell you later.” 20 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 So a couple of weeks later, he called and he said, “I have been doing a little studying on Wyoming,” he said, “The only time I hear about the weather is Pinedale.” And he said “I don’t want to go out there if Pinedale is tutor for that.” But anyway, Art came and took over and then I became the Dean of Faculty. We were growing so rapidly that local funding, most State and local funding, just couldn’t handle the growth, the need for instructors, the need for space, and so building a faculty and building buildings became a major task. Tim was always interested in building. He loved planning and working with contractors and getting the money and watching the buildings come up and all that and so he sorta let me handle the academics and he took care of that. Before the foundation, we had a great a Board of Trustees, I mean a great board, one of them was an attorney, Bill Brown, and Bill got this idea “let’s start a foundation.” He said, “there is a lot of money around here and the pride in the college, it’s growing, I think it will work out real well.” So, he and Tim went to work on that and developed that foundation. Besides working with the faculty one of my other jobs, well I had to write proposals to the feds for federal money for faculty. I remember one year, I don’t know which year it was, but one year we hired 27 people and most of them were subsidized to some degree on Federal Money. Of course we had to find places to put those people. We closed in the only bond issue, in my tenor here. We built the college center; we built the end on the south end[Audio part three ends] Hedgpeth: [talks about the recorder] Okay the only bond issue that you had during your tenner? Loftin: We built the College Center, we built the, put the end of the old administration building, on the east end. Let’s see, the business building which is now the Alley – no Fine Arts Building. Hedgpeth: I’ve got to make sure I pressed both of those next time, I don’t think I did, but I got it here so we’re good. Loftin: Let’s see, we put an extension on the old auto shop for agriculture. But there was also private money come into the Foundation to finish these things off and add onto the Community Life Science. That was an interesting deal, we had a guy, a banker, Bobby Miracle, and he knew we needed another building. He would not serve on the Board, he said, “I could be more help to you in the community than I can be on the Board.” So he came up and he told the Board, he said, “I know you need a new Life Science Building, here’s what I want you to do, I want you to give me permission, the authority to get one other person that I have complete confidence in and he will get a person, he has complete confidence in and he will get- until we have about a dozen people and we will go get you the money.” So Bobby gets them together and they meet with the Board and off they go. As an example, Bobby Miracle was a guy that, he was obsessed with getting a job done. He goes to an attorney’s office and says “I want you to pledge money for this new building.” And the guy says, “Yeah, I will.” And he turned around to his desk to go to work again and Bob just sat there. The guy turned around and said, “I told you plain,” he said. 21 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 “I changed my mind”. Bobby said, “I changed my mind, I want a check”. The guy said, “I’ll get it to you.” Bob said, “I’m not moving.” I don’t know how long he sat there, a couple hours, and finally he wrote him out a check. That’s the way they got the money together for the community Life Science Building. The buildings here, we’ve been so fortunate to be in a community that has such pride in an institution that they will give their money to see it grow and have the facilities that they are going to need. But there is a reverse to that too, the institution has to be good enough that they have pride in it. So it’s a two way street but I don’t know of any institution, and I’ve traveled the North Central Area. I don’t know of any other institution in the north central area, even some senior colleges, that has the support that this institution has in it’s community. Well anyway, I had better back up, as the campus was growing, of course our faculty was growing, student body was growing and we were having to add programs. One that we got into Exxon Corporation sent a team out from Tulsa to the University of Wyoming. They wanted them to educate their employees to open a uranium mine and mill over north of Douglas. University said, “Well we have engineering programs, or courses, they can take those courses.” Well that isn’t what they wanted; they didn’t want them here for four years. They wanted them educated, actually trained, not educated, trained, and to go in to do that work. So they came to us and wanted to know if that was something we could do for them. And we structured a program specifically for that – for the mining and the milling. Exxon wanted all their people to be able to do every job. They wanted them trained so they could weld, they could run equipment, they could do chemical testing, all this. And I told the guy from Tulsa, he was sorta a smart ass little guy, pardon me, [laughs]. And he thought he knew a lot of what was going on, I am sure he was a bright engineer. I told him right then, “You’re going to find that humans will find things that they either do not want to do or they are afraid to do, and you are going to ask these people to do everything.” We tried, we gave them a pretty good education and the other thing we did, we wrote him out a curriculum. We asked him, “What do you want, what are your --- well anyway we wrote out a curriculum and in it we included, Wyoming History, and one other, I can’t remember what it was now but pressed with Wyoming and we sent it to him, he wrote back and had it scratched out and he said “We don’t want any of that.” We said, “You’re going to have people here that will come to work for you that are not Wyomingites, not native, they are going into a community, they are going to be tearing things up, they are going to be causing some problems for that community in housing and transportation, and if they know a little bit about Wyoming and the people, a just a little bit about its history, they will have a better feel for that community and they will fit in better.” Well he bought it and we did that through the coal program and one of their pump guys wound up as mayor of Gillette. But anyway, this program, it didn’t run too many years, bottom fell out of the uranium prices, but they found, some of the guys were afraid of electricity and were afraid of welding and so they had to find people who would do welding and these people would drive equipment or do some other things so they found out we were pretty right in human nature and their education and working. So that program didn’t last too long but then they came back on the coal field technology program and we ran that for a good long time. Our faculty really sucked it up because they were teaching 12 months out of the year. Working that program in the summer, doing their regular teaching during the year. 22 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Hedgpeth: Now, were you still teaching at this time when you were Dean of Students or Dean of Faculty? Loftin: No – I taught only twice. Agriculture, Bill Henry whose head of Ag Department, Life Science Department wanted me to teach genetics mainly to his Ag people, at night. This would be over and above their regular, so I taught I think, two winters, one semester in the winter, I taught genetics and that’s the only other teaching that I did. I just did basic school teacher. But anyway, the programs were increasing, the needs, electronics, we started really expanding, which was expensive, they were getting into miniature circuitry and the making the circuit boards, and what have you. And we had a legislator that came to us and said, “We need truck drivers”. And we said. “That isn’t really a collegiate program, collegiate level program, but we think we can work it out. We’ll need some help from you.” So we bought trucks and got them started in that program which turned out to be a very good program. Put a lot of people to work. Heavy equipment was another one. The industry really growing in the coal field technology and the oil fields and construction and what have you, heavy equipment operators were in need, again, not a collegiate program, but Tim being Tim, we also found that heavy equipment program, they could be learning but they could also be helping the college in developing land for buildings and roadways and what have you. Hedgpeth: On the job training. Loftin: Yeah it was, it really was, very good. And it did work well for the students, they went out and went to good jobs, high paying jobs and also we were getting some very expensive stuff done on campus that allowed us to develop the campus and still have that good program. So that worked out pretty well. And of course, one of my jobs was to hire people and I think I was awfully lucky finding good people. I’ll say this, I had no problem in hiring a former high school teacher that had a master’s degree in their area. They knew how to teach school, most of them. If they didn’t I didn’t hire them. I couldn’t hire people today. Someone said, “How do you know who to hire?” I said, “My navel tells me.” I couldn’t write that down on a federal form and get it accepted, but I had a feel for people that told me, “Yeah, I think they will work out okay.” Of course I reviewed everything. I had a person hired one time, said “In our interview, you didn’t ask me very many questions.” I said, “I asked you enough, I got you talking.” And I said, “You told me everything I wanted to know and I didn’t have to ask.” But, it’s a scary job, to me, to have someone come in, you don’t have any idea who they are, don’t know anything about them. You’ve read transcripts, you’ve read letters and what have you but you really don’t know that person and the personality, drive. To me is a bit scary but I think I was lucky. Awfully good people. Hedgpeth: Pretty good success rate? Loftin: Very good, very good. They were inspired. I think, the dynamics of the community, the dynamics of the college and it’s growing, expanding, building, students coming in, new people 23 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 being hired. I think all that together really inspired people to do the best they could possibly do in the classroom. Outside classrooms, in the community and I hope that’s still going. We got to where we had to hire Dean of Student’s Counselors and relieve the faculty of student responsibilities on weekends and so forth. I think we lost something in doing that both the teacher and the student. But that became the province of the Student Personnel Division and we had to get into security, were big enough, that we had to get into security. And, might tell a little story here. We – Paul Dannigan, who was police chief, ready to retire, and we were around discussing qualifications, there were two or other people that had applied and I had interviewed him. Tim wanted him bad. Tram wanted him bad; of course they had both been policemen in the service so. Hedgpeth: Oh, I didn’t know Loftin: They had a real warm sport for him, they wanted him and I was the only one that voted against him. I said, he was known as a tough cop. I said, here we got kids up here, I don’t know how he is going to relate, shift gears, come up here and work with students. Some of them you know do stupid things, what have you. Well I was out voted. At the end of that year, there was a line of kids all the way down the hall. Dannigan at that time was in the administration building, right down south of the west corner or northwest corner, office, there were kids lined up all the way down the hallway to come in and talk to him, thanking him for keeping them out of jail. [phone rings] Hedgpeth: yep, Okay. So a line of students down his hall. Loftin: We couldn’t have found a better person to do this. He was tough I mean he was demanding on students but he also knew kids do foolish things and he had kinda taken care of stuff when they go to be picked up. He would go down there and kinda straighten things out. He had other police that came to work for us, retired, so we had a pretty good security force. I think we had about three people but they were all accomplished police and I think they had feelings for young people. But, I’ve got off on my track. Hedgpeth: Well can I ask you a question here? Between being Dean of Students and Dean of Faculty, which do you think was more challenging and why? Loftin: Most challenging, Dean of Students, as the b?????? you know when you’ve done your weeks work, and they are just coming alive. You get calls all hours of the day and night. You’re at the police station, you are at the hospital. I remember I got a call, we had dorms by then, Bailey and Morad, got a call a girl had committed suicide or was going to commit suicide. She had taken something. So I had to call security, haul her to emergency room, I meet you down there. So we go down there, she happened to be the daughter of a physician, out of county, and Doctor examined her and said, she didn’t take anything, she is faking it. I said, “Well what are you going to do?” He said, “I’m going to swab her stomach out, she is going to remember this”. 24 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 But you know we were lucky, didn’t have many serious problems. I do remember, we had a situation, this is when I was still Dean of Students, had a call, said, this kid’s missing, two of them are missing, one of them is a ball player. This was right before Christmas vacation and I said, “Well, what do we know about them?” This one had a car, they were both from out of State, so I got to inquiring around got a phone call from the dorm, said this one showed up over here. So I called him to come over. He came over, he was a big hulk, and I was visiting with him a little bit and I said, “You know where this other basketball player is?” [Student] “Nope” and I, we talked a little bit, he slept and I picked up a clue and I said “You just mentioned that you had him in the car, where did you go?” [Student] “Scotsbluff.” [Loftin] “What did you go to Scotsbluff for?” [Student] “He wanted to fly out of there.” [Loftin] “What, home?” He was from Michigan, Antrim? 9:49:40 Michigan. So I kept talking to him, pretty one came in and said, “There was a robbery missing and maybe there were some students involved in it.” So I got in on that, got a call from a Board Member that said, “Someone broke into my office.” He was an attorney, “Someone broke into my office and they thought it was a student.” This was all going on at the same time. So I had another call, that we had a student who was working for a store downtown and a firearm was missing. Well all this tied together eventually. I asked this kid I had in the office, I said, “Where were you last, what were you guys doing?” Well he finally said, “Well we wound up at the Avalon.” Well the Avalon had been robbed and I said “Well who all was with you?” [Student] “Well, this basketball player”. I said “Did you steal whiskey at the Avalon?” [Student] “Oh no.” I said, “Let’s go look at your car, I would like to see your car.” He didn’t want to do it. We opened the trunk; there were probably six or seven bottles of whiskey in that trunk. This goes on and on, we found the pistol that the kid said he had mailed it but he had taken it himself. Before the guy, the attorney, got back to his office, we found his TV set, yeah, that’s a hell of a job. It really is. At times it is great. I remember I was asked to speak to the Honor Society and I said, “You know I really don’t recognize any of you.” I said “I don’t see much of you folks,” but it is a very challenging job but being faculty in many ways is equally, it’s not physically, as demanding as Dean of Students because there you’re all kind of places. But [as Dean of Faculty] you are dealing with adults, you are dealing with people who are educated, professional, they had their problems. I had a Division Chairman come to me one time and said “I want that guy fired.” I said, “Well give me some reasons.” [Chairman] “I don’t like him,” [Loftin] “Well I don’t either but what’s that got to do with it and it was a personality conflict. And I said to her, I said, “If you are going to be Division Chair, you have to work with these people,” I said, “I’m not asking you to like the guy, love the guy; I want you to be his Division Chairman. If he has problems, work with him on them.” I said, “You know there are a lot of people around here that I don’t like but I’m hired to work with them. You are hired to work with him.” She came back a couple weeks later and said, 25 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 “By God that works.” And I had another instructor come to me and want a guy fired, and I said “You’ll give me some particulars here.” [Instructor] “Well he is proselytizing for the Catholic church.” I said, “Well tell me about it.” I’m getting into some personal stuff here, I won’t mention names but I have to mention different ones. This person taught Western II. He taught philosophy. He said he was proselytizing for the Catholic Church, he was Catholic, devote Catholic, devoted Catholics, whatever it is. And I said, “You don’t teach anything about the Catholic Church?” I said, “How in the world can you teach Western Civilization and not get into all the influence the Catholic Church has had on the Western Civilization? She just looked at me got up and left. Again, personalities. You got to be a politician. I think you have to understand human nature; you have to understand your people. I knew his religion because he was always telling me about it. That’s the only person I really knew unless they went to my church. Knew their religion. I did not know their politics; I did not want to know about their politics. But I wanted to know family, I wanted to know their background, I wanted to know what they did on weekends so I could better understand them as a human being. It is challenging, the problems they would have, personal problems. They couldn’t divorce it from their professional life. Events in the family, kids getting into trouble, divorces. All the human things that happen in a person’s life. And they have to work with that and I had to work with them. So they could keep teaching in school and do their job. I figured that was the only thing I had been hired for, was to make sure people taught school and they did it right. Firing people and just handling people in general. I had a guy come to me, he was basically he head of custodial maintenance. He wanted this guy fired and I said well, I called personnel and I said, “bring this guy’s folder down,” that he wanted fired and I looked it over and I said “About a month ago you did an evaluation,” I said, “there is nothing under satisfactory, nothing. Now you want him fired.” [Custodial Maintenance] “Well.” I said “His attorney would eat us alive.” Well we came in and tried to fire him, and had this kind of [conversation], now I want him fired too, you know,” Well he did such things as he went down to pick up checks, boxes of checks, they didn’t deliver them then, as a prank I mean, boxes of them. He opened the tops of them, but he didn’t close them. Had them in the back of the pick-up. He drove all the way down with those checks flying. They were to haul stuff for the symphony, we furnished them with certain music instruments, that was an agreement we had with them, certain instruments, but we would haul them down there. There happened to be a couple of xylophones. He put them in the back of the pickup, didn’t tie them up, left the tailgate down and drove right out from under them. Now this was deliberate. I knew it. But how do you prove something like that? So anyway I told Bobby Walkenshaw was doing all the supervising, buildings and the building program and we had a young fellow that was a carpenter and I had real faith in and I said, “I want you guys to watch this guy,” I said “Don’t dog him, don’t let him know you are” but I said “I want to know every time he breaths, I want it written down as to time, who witnessed it, what he did, the whole bit.” We did that for a year and he handed me a pack of stuff and I took it to our attorney and I said “What do you think Butch?” He said, “Let him sue us, I’d love this one.” But he didn’t. Bobby told him ‘he was fired and here is his check 26 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 for the next two weeks and see you.’ And he got mad and he cussed everybody but he got up and walked out and that was the last problem we had with him. You know dealing with personnel at all levels becomes a real problem and when you’re Dean of Faculty you are in administration and you get all kinds of side jobs out of that. I had a Division Chair come to me, this was up in the shop area, wanted a guy fired and I said, “Okay, tell me the deal.” He handed me a deal about that thick and I started to look through it. Boy it was well done. Now, he had been in industry and he wanted to get out of that and get into teaching where, the first one was an excellent teacher but he wanted to get out of that hubbub of the business world and I read through that and I called the guy in the next morning and I said, it was in the spring of the year, and I said “I’m not going to renew your contract.” [Instructor] “Well you can’t do that, I’m tenured.” I said “I just did it you’re not going to get a contract.” Well he said, “I don’t know why you’re doing this” I said “Sit down.” So I opened it [the folder] up and I started reading, dates, time, people all that. And I said “Now you know, losing a job is a family affair, go home and talk to your family about it. What’cha going to do about it.” I said, “You’re done.” The next morning he came in and handed me a letter. It was the most glowing letter I had ever read in my life, he had enjoyed his teaching, we had been so good to him, you know, on and on and on. That was it. This was one of the hardest jobs, I think for people, outside of the administration, their 10:01:21[???] administers, Division Chairs, what have you. Under our system at least, what’s going on [elsewhere]. They wanted to be liked; they didn’t like to have, to create any problems. So they wouldn’t write things down. They’re busy. They wouldn’t write things down, they wouldn’t record things, they didn’t really talked to people about those kind of things, until it grew to the point that they were sick and tired of the whole thing, they wanted it over with and then from our standpoint you’ve got nothing to stand on. So those kinds of things, educating the division chairs, this is additional work, but it saves you a lot of work in evaluating these people. And evaluate them good as well as problems. So we get a clearer picture of what we are really dealing with. So I add, they are both tough, they are both tough. You’re dealing with different people under different circumstances and different problems but you get, some of ‘em are amusing, I got a call from, a guy who was teaching business machines he said “I turned on the light, and it began to smoke and tar falling down, what am I going to do?” I said “Turn the switch off.” But you know, it is things like that, I had a woman come into me, closed the door, closed the shades told me she had an affair with another instructor and you know, I love my husband and all this kind of stuff, got up and walked out, well why did I have to know it, you know. But anyway, I still harbor that in my mind, I’ve never told anybody who it is or anything else, I didn’t want to know it. But it is another one of those things. Sometimes they come in and unload something on you and there is nothing you can do about it, they don’t want you to do anything about it, they just want to talk to you. And that’s one of things that’s part of the job that why some people can’t handle it, they can’t listen. They gotta be talking instead of listening. Sometimes, you don’t want to hear it, but there is nothing you can do about it but take that energy off their chest and you’re handy. 27 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Hedgpeth: So, can we switch gears and from Dean of Faculty to Vice-President? Loftin: It wasn’t that different, I think Tim really turned things over to me. He was busy in the Foundation, he was busy with politics, he was busy with the board, the foundation board, what have you and I just pretty well took care of the academic parts of. I got more and more into of working with the division chairs. Developing curriculum, expanding programs, developing new programs. And I did get more into politics, while I was working, I never missed a board meeting, but Tim was good that way in that he didn’t feel threatened. I attended all the board meetings I attended, the foundation board meetings, I had started dealing with legislatures and that was good because what I eventually did that was my training for that position. Hedgpeth: Do you think Dr. Aley had you in mind as a successor? Loftin: I really don’t know, I really don’t know. I think he knew I was going to do something somewhere and I think he felt, you know. Well we were good buddies, we were good friends, and I think we felt comfortable with each other. We worked together very well. We accepted the other’s thoughts, proposals, we felt free to say you know, it stinks, forget it, without being a 10:06:35wreaker/Wanker you know we were doing business. I think, no I think Tim felt that I was going to do something somewhere and when he decided to retire, I didn’t apply for three or four months and I got to thinking about it and I thought I think I could do as well as anyone else and so I made application. But that particular job really broadened. I stood with the Dean of Faculty working with the existing curriculum and so forth. It expanded in many different ways and by then I had my Doctorate and then I also I got to working with North Central Association as a consultant examiner. Hedgpeth: North Central Association? Loftin: Yeah, this is the accrediting authority for the 19 state area, North Central, headquartered in Chicago. They select individuals who have quite a bit of experience in various kinds of things and they form teams, depending upon the size of school, I was on one with two and I was on one with 16. Three multi campus in Colorado but that kind of thing really broadens your- [other tape recorder clicks stopped] Hedgpeth: You can continue. Loftin: It really broadens your conduct and it also gives you a pretty good strain because you are in someone else’s institution trying to tell them how to, you don’t tell them what to do, but you tell them, “Here’s your problems, here are you strengths and your weaknesses. Here some things you should look at.” I was at one in Illinois, the first, I met with faculty first thing they said was “Fire the President.” I said, “You have the wrong group, we do not do that, talk to the Board of Trustees.” But they kept harping on it, harping on it, “Fire the President.” Well you probably don’t want put that,” but anyway that’s being Vice-President for Academic affairs. You are meeting with people who want new programs after business and industry- various groups, and 28 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 you are working with them, to try to see what they want and what they need and then developing curriculum, finding faculty, equipment, all that kind of stuff so it was considerably different that just being faculty. Hedgpeth: How long were you Vice-President of Academic Affairs? Loftin: Oh boy, I got my doctorate in ’68 and I became President, whenever. Hedgpeth:’79, 1979? Loftin:’79 yeah. That was an interesting deal. Where do you want to go from here? Hedgpeth: Well why don’t we go ahead and you stated that in 1979 that when you became President, you wanted Casper College to be an institution that is student oriented. Loftin: Yeah, that was just a continuation of my feelings and then the way I worked as Dean of Students and what have you. I wanted an understanding but I remember going before the faculty at the beginning of the year and I said, “You know you should be very proud, we are growing, we got a lot of students coming in. Those students picked here. You should be proud of that fact. And the faculty, that they are coming to you, they have made that selection. There are other places they could have gone but they selected this place. To me that’s thrilling. And they should look at it the same way.” I wanted the faculty to understand that this was not their institution. This belongs to the students; it belongs to the community and more and more to the State. And that you are employed here to satisfy those people, educate those people, and make them feel good. So that was just my operating philosophy. I had heard some people; I heard them say, “Well these kids couldn’t go to the University.” Well we had a lot of people that went to the University and came here. We picked up a couple hundred kids every fall or beginning of spring semester, who went to the University and for various reasons they flunked out, or they didn’t like it that big, what have you, they came back to us. So that’s just, and I told them, “I don’t care how old a person is, if they are coming here for an education, let’s treat them like a student. Treat them well.” And so that’s just, I don’t know, just the way I operated. Just a feeling I had that that’s what we are here for. Hedgepeth: Okay, well let’s talk about your presidency then. Loftin: Well listen, are you going to stay here, I don’t care. Hedgepeth: I’m good right now. We’ve got a whole other side of a tape, you are all right sir, you getting tired. Loftin: I’ve got to get home by about 1:00 o’clock. Hedgepeth: Okay 29 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Loftin: My wife’s leaving for Fort Collins. Hedgepeth: Okay, we’ve got some time here, I think we can do it, the last part of it. Loftin: I did not want to be President. I didn’t. And I didn’t want to see Tim quit, but he was pretty well burned out and it was his decision and as I said, “I didn’t apply for the job for three or four months after it opened up, but I guess my ego said, ‘You can do this as well as anybody, so take a shot at it.” I am very lucky in that, I didn’t know this until after I was hired, but there were petitions from faculty to the board of trustees, requesting that I be hired as President. Didn’t get them all but I remember there were about 98% of the faculty signed a petition which made me feel good. It really felt like just changing offices. A little later, when I had to go to the legislature and these kinds of things it changed, but I just felt at home. I was working with the same people, we had the same philosophy we always had and I was interviewed by the TV station and I said “Nothing is going to change very fast.” I said, “There may be some changes made but I said right now, ships upright and doing well and I’m not going to change it. Tim got a good ship.” We started, I remember one of the first meetings I had with faculty, I said, “How many of you would use a computer?” [Faculty] “We don’t want computers.” That was an old C-3 I believe it was and it was in my office. Of course we had the main frame, but you go into any classroom, there’s no computers. The engineers and some of the mathematicians were using the main frame. That was the old card system for gosh sakes, but the engineering students were getting a taste of it. So I asked the faculty, “How many of you people would use a computer? Well you would have thought I asked them, “How many of you are going to hell?” Oh, my, we don’t want to learn programming and that kinds of stuff, and I said, “You don’t have to learn programing, some of you will, maybe later. But the programs are out there, pick the ones that will work, come in and use them.” Well they started getting interested, business was particularly, was, I think, probably one of the first one that kinda got interested in it. I remember Arlene Larson had a writing lab and she said, I would like to try computers so I put out bids for computers, we were going to buy about 15 and we wound up with the old TRS- 80 TR put out by Radio Shack, and I said, “Why did you get those?” Well, they work for that program very well, and what she wanted to do was see in using the computer where you could go back and correct. You could go back later and make all the changes, flop sentences, paragraphs, would that make them more creative? Instead of having to stop and erase, or when you are on a typewriter, you have to white out and what have you, which interrupts your thoughts? She explained to the students, “Just do it and later you can go back very easily and make those changes.” I don’t know what she came up with but it sounded good to me, so we bought her 15 computers. That was one of the big changes in seeing this age going out here, going that direction and we were really weren’t up to it, we weren’t keeping up. We started having requests for secretaries, computers, particular software. So we finally, well we went to the legislature, appropriations committee, Sinclair Orendorff and myself and Chuck Rogers, who was at Torrington, to request bookoo money to get us started in computers, in structure computers. The chairman of the appropriation committee, co-chairman happened to be from Casper and he said, “Boy that is a lot of money.” And he said, “How many 30 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 computers you guys own?” And I said “Sinclair, you got one, Chuck, you got one, and we got one.” Three institutions and we got a computer in each one. [Chairman] “Well, that’s a lot of money.” I said, “Well, these , well two of us Powell and Casper, has a returned of 3 quarters of a million dollars because we made more money through tuition, fees, what have you, we have all these students than we said two years ago in our appropriations request that we would have. We couldn’t keep the money, they wouldn’t let us keep it, I said, “there is three quarter of a million.” “Well,” he said, “that might work.” They gave us $250,000, but it got us started. We started developing land, business, for instance, was one that really wanted to get into procuring county. Electronics, so we got into the computer age and the faculty started catching on, that all that software out there, someone has developed this neat stuff. Now I walk around campus, you go to the bathroom, they’ve got computers. Which makes me feel good because that is the way things are going. And we got in in time, in to [electronic age in time at] the College. I had a kid come to me one time, many years ago, he went from here, he spent two years here, and then he went to Southern Methodist University. He came back Christmas and he said, he stopped in my office, he said “I want to tell you that I have spent a year at Southern Methodist and I have not found any instructors or any instructions as good as I got right here.” I said, “I like to hear that.” He said, but, he was in business, “I haven’t seen a rotary calculator since I’ve been down there.” That hurt, that hurt. We got rid of our rotary calculators and we started getting electronic calculators. But this is a- well as President see you- you’re in charge of all that crap plus a lot of politics, I hate, I hate politics. Went down and talked to one of our legislators, he promised me the moon and did nothing. He got rid of me, you know. Another one who was in the minority party, was a good friend of mine, I’d go talk to him, I got something. You gotta live with the stuff, but there is politics in faculty, just as well, there is politics in the local community. Hegepeth: What were your dealings with the Board of Trustees, while you were president? Loftin: Well I’ll tell you, we had a tremendous Board of Trustees. They didn’t get into our business, we kept them plenty informed and I remember we had a woman on the board, new member, and I don’t know if you are familiar with our County since that time but you had string of numbers which was an account and the numbers changed with different accounts, you know, all laid out, all the money right there and we would give them three years of that stuff so they could see what happened three years ago, so she said, “I think you need to break this down more so we know exactly what you are spending this money for.” I mean she meant by item, you know, if we bought a bottle of water, we bought a calculator and the president of the board was a business man, who ran a large company, and he said, “You know I think we are getting along real well, let’s move on”. Hedgpeth: Next order of business, yeah. Loftin: It was an education for her, I mean he didn’t say it with anger, but just “Let’s move on.” She got the message but they didn’t get into our business but they knew what was going on. And for instance, when I interviewed well, I had been selected as President, I told the board I would 31 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 like to meet in an executive session, my first time with the board. I said, we’ve got a personnel matter and the personnel was me, I said that I want the board to tell me exactly what you want me to do. And the Board President said, “Run this place, run it right or we will fire you and get someone that does.” I said, “I understand that.” That’s the way they ran it. The Board knew the community that was the thing that was their strength. They were up from this community, long standing, all professional people, they knew the community. That helped me because I didn’t know the community the way they did. They didn’t try to tell us how to teach school, who to hire, who to fire, who to buy from, all they said was when you go out to buy something, make sure that everyone gets a chance. In other words, here is what we need, here’s the specks bid on it. And, they wanted it local, if they could possibly get it local. With the latest stink, the city, here, what have you. Every building we built, while I was here, it was a low quality 10:25:06. Every building we built had a local contractor, at least in State. Sometimes Wright or Cheyenne would bid on a building. Equipping buildings, there were times we couldn’t. I remember ordering a bunch of computers, portables, because they were going out to high schools and carrying the computers with them and I bought those from a dealer out of State and I heard about it. Board President said, “Why did you do that?” I said, “We put it out on bid,” and I said, “we got we got a pretty good bid here but that was just with the computers. They are furnishing us with the same bid, they are furnishing us with cases to put them in and a couple other little things over and above what the bid was for, I mean what the request was for. So I had to go with them.” [Board President] “Okay, that makes sense.” I think there is a change, a bit of a change in the attitude of the faculty when you take that top rung. I don’t know what it is, I don’t understand it. But there are guys that I had fished with and hunted with, some of those got kinda stand offish. I guess, maybe I did too, I remember my secretary, right before I retired, said, “Dr. Loftin you don’t have many close friends, guys you buddy around with. Why?” And I said well, “I am going to have to fire some people, I am going to have to reprimand some people and I don’t want friendship to get in the way.” I said, “I miss ‘em but I didn’t want to be perceived as someone who takes care of my friends.” I said, “I don’t like it but it goes with the job.” She said, “How can you do that?” I said, “That’s what I gotta do. For me that is what I have to do.” And I had to reprimand some people who I had fished with but I believe in equality and in my own mind I felt that was the only way I could really handle it, was to, I guess that makes me stand off-ish, doesn’t it? Hedgpeth: Well if it works. Can I ask you some more questions? Loftin: Yes. Hedgpeth: Alright. Well, we’ve talked about that. You, at one point you said you were opposed to admission requirements stating, and I quote, “A community college must be an open door institution,” what are your thoughts on that? 32 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Loftin: Well I think it is the philosophy of the institution, not the institution, it is the philosophy of the community college as they have developed. Junior Colleges, it urks me when people say “Junior College,” we’re not. Never have been. And I try to tell them the difference but we, the community college philosophy is to make yourself available to anyone who wants to. Now if you get rid of them later, that’s fine but give them a chance. I remember a little old lady that used to wonder around classes, the little old lady was taking ceramics. She wanted to be potter, she was probably sixty five and in months, he tried and he worked with her and when she finished the class, she had basically a pile of mud and he gave her an “F.” And the next semester I got a call from him, he said, “That woman is back, she wants,” he said “She can’t do it.” I said, “Give her a chance, and give her one more chance.” She did get better. And she said, “You know, I can’t do that.” To me that was a part of her education, she learned “I can’t do this, I want to but I can’t.” I don’t care if it is a freshman; a sixty year old woman comes in and wants to do something, we give them a chance. If they can’t cut it, maybe they get mad at us, you know, that’s the way it goes. But in her case and I know of others that said, “You know, I can’t do this so I’ll try something else.” Well to me that is Community College philosophy. You give them the best shot you can give them. We had a guy, who was very prominent in this country; he got a full ride to Yale, a full ride. He told me, he said, “I partied up a storm and they told me, “You go get this straighten out and you can come back, otherwise you’re out of here.” He went to two or three different places to get in and they wouldn’t take him because he had failed. We took him. He did very well, stayed with us one year but he got his record clean and he moved on. He told me, “You know, you saved my life.” 10:31:26 And I don’t want it on here but that was the Vice President of the United States, Cheney. Hedgpeth: That’s important. Loftin: Well, again, it answers a question, what are we here for? He wasn’t the only one, I know another kid that came out of the service of the Korean War, he was hellion and he drank like a fish, fight, and scratch, what have you. He got kicked out of the University, he comes here, He said, “Will you let me in?, “We’ll let you in for one semester on probation, if you don’t cut it you’re out of here, then you’re dead.” Straight “A’s” in Accounting, finished two years with us Straight “A’s” and went to the University of Denver, graduated Cum Laude, in accounting. Now in a very large accounting firm in Denver now, very successful. What are we here for? Hedgpeth: While you were President, there was a lot of talk and discussion about Casper College, once again becoming a four year institution. Loftin: Yeah, yeah. Well Tim, that was one of his passions, and he wasn’t by himself. This community wanted it. We had a legislature that is 95% graduates of the University of Wyoming and 90% of those are members of the “Cowboy Joe” Club. The rest of the legislature either went to Yale, or Notre Dame or what have you. They don’t have much of a philosophy of community colleges. The community was real hot, and there were people outside of the community, across the state that could see that this is something that is needed. We wasted a lot of energy, a lot of 33 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 time, a lot of thought in how to convince people, particularly those who have the power and the money, that this is needed. Dick Tobin, who is on our board, was President of Senate introduced a bill one year to make this into a four year school. It had almost passed but it was a farce. They gave enough votes to make Dick feel good. During that session, Tim and I were down at the legislature and legislator from Cheyenne came to me and he said, “You know this is a good idea, I think you have a darned good idea here but I have a problem.” I said, “What’s your problem”? [Legislator] “How could we keep you from playing football?” I said “We don’t want to play football, we want to teach school.” Well that went down the toilet but anyway, the idea hasn’t gone away. I think there was a time when it got pretty low on people’s thinking but I’m hearing it now more, coming up more interest in it. I took a shot, I told the board one time, I said “We need Upper division in this community. There are a lot of people here who want an education, need an education. They can’t afford to leave, too many problems, I problems with kids, jobs, what have you, but they want an education, they need an education beyond what we can afford.” I said, “I think maybe it’s time that this Board take a leap of faith and say “Okay, we are going to invite somebody in here to join with us to have an upper division.” Had a couple of board members who looked at me like, “You know you are out of your mind.” But they discussed it and finally said “What can you work out, see what you can work out.” The President of the University then was, anyway he was an astronomer and he wanted, I mean he was a common sense guy, and he said, “Let’s go to work on this.” Sitting down in his office, he formed a little committee, he and I formed a little committee, to say “What do we want? What do you want up here? What do we want up here? And what can we agree on?” I kept the Board informed, everything that was happening. Well finally, we got an agreement that both boards would buy. My board President didn’t want to do it. But he signed it. I wasn’t overly happy with it but I signed it. Their Board Chairman signed it right here in this building and their President signed it. In my mind, in my lifetime, it is the only way we are going to get upper division here. Someone told me we graduated a hundred and some kids last year. We now have other institutions, the freedom to bring in other institutions to offer various specialties on our upper division level. North Central has noticed this, the accrediting authority, because they want to make sure you are doing what you say you are doing and they are pretty particular about it. They were I guess they still are. But, my Dad would say “There is more than one way to skin a cat.” I still would like to see an upper division run by this institution as a State college but until we get there politically, I think we have the next best thing and I know some people awfully tickled because it is here. They had a chance to do it. Hedgpeth: Well you did a great job. That was my thoughts regarding the UW CC merger. Loftin: Well we had some real problems when it first came, they sent a young administrator up here that wanted to impress them. He was not very cooperative. He was stand-offish and sorta had the aura that “we are better than you.” They wanted the use of our instructors, which was part of our agreement. Those that had the qualifications, who wanted to teach university then 34 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 would let them teach in the upper division. That created some problems because our pay scale was considerably different. I had a mathematician that would have gone with a full time because he never had enough money, but anyway, he was getting more money per hour working for them than he was for us. So there were some of those problems. The last association I had with them, they had a new director. He must have gotten his under-graduate degree at a community college because he had that attitude, and things were going well, the faculties were meshing both on and off campus. So it was becoming sort of one institution type of feel and attitude so I think it has worked out reasonably well. I still think we need an upper division here. I think the State would be better off. I believe in competition and if they could run us off that’s fine, and if we could run them off, that’s fine. Hedgpeth: What do you think you’re greatest achievement was while you were President? At one point and one, I think in your retirement you had mentioned the Gertrude Krampert Theater, the maintenance building, forensic team, animal judging, had quite a list of buildings that were actually, The Goodstein Foundation Visual Arts Center and Roberts Common, Tate Earth Science Center and the Neurological Museum, Grace Werner Agricultural Pavilion, Harry T. Thorsen Institute of Business, Center for Career Studies, The Inga Thorsen Terrace, the Theater, Casper College Pavilion all of these during your Presidency, what do you consider the greatest achievement? Loftin: I don’t think any one. I really don’t. The Theater, I had a thrill out of the Theater. We had the little Theater downstairs, you never saw it. I don’t know what is down there now. Hedgpeth: Books. Loftin: Okay, oh no, no excuse me, I mean in the Administration Building. [I believe the theater was located in the building called Administration Building, now the Liesinger Hall as of 2014, before the East end was built on, and it was located on the second floor from the College Drive Street entrance, A. Martin] Hedgpeth: Oh, now I’ve never been there. Loftin: As you come in the front door, it is across from the boiler room. Hedgpeth: I.T. LabsLoftin: That’s right. Well that was the little theater and I had never seen Theater in the round so much until I came here. Ken Ury, he was the director and the community liked it. Then to roam around in that thing, we are growing. It was so inadequate then to talk Mrs. Krampert into coughing up some money, then the foundation came in with the rest. To see that building built and to have Tom Empey here at the same time, it was great. I went to the Commission, the legislature was then getting onto community colleges for buildings, if they could match it and work out some kind of thing. And Riverton got a bunch of 35 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 money for a theater, I don’t know, various things like that, and they said, “What’s your request”? And I said “I need some money for a Maintenance Building.” [Commissioners] “Maintenance Building?” “Yeah,” I said, “We’ve got stuff stacked everywhere, it is inefficient.” They said, “People are after classrooms, theaters, you asked for a maintenance building.” I said, “You asked me what I need, that was it.” And it changed a lot of things. We had an auto shop where we could do their servicing, what have you. Storage! I remember one year we had a little money left over, the legislature wouldn’t take [so] we built a whole year’s supply of mimeograph paper. We had a place to put it, safely. You can buy in bulk, you know we can buy for a whole year of light bulbs, and all this kind of stuff, which we were normally buying just what we needed at the time. So it was, that building did a lot of things, a place where they could go and have coffee and meet and be together. It was safe, it was nice. It was efficient, so that was I mean I didn’t get teary eyed over that one. That was one that was just sorely needed by the institution. The addition to this building, to me, Tim felt the same way, you don’t have a college until you have a library. It should have become the center of the institution. You can turn right, there is a property supply people in there that, and I think we had them, that know what the library is for they treat it that way. So this addition, again Goodstein’s coming through on that one, to me it was very satisfying to have a very efficient, beautiful library that you would want to go to. And it had the various things, not just books; it had the various things that was needed, like you got here, to serve the community, not just the students that were enrolled, but the community. Let’s see. The, I don’t know, it is up there now the diesel, auto mechanic and diesel I think, that was one that was really needed by the community. The business community. We are lucky, we had a guy come in and he had worked in a diesel industry for 25 years, worked for Cummins, he came in and said, “I’d like to teach.” [Loftin] “What for, we can’t match your money” He never cared about that. He said, “One reason, let me be honest with you, one reason is that I’m getting sick and tired of being called at midnight, to go out into the oilfield and crawl under a caterpillar to repair it in a ground blizzard.” He said, “I’m just peeved. But he said, “Also, I think I can teach these kids something.” He said, I think I can make real good mechanics out of them and he did. Some of the best teachers I had were up on the hill. Let’s see, you know I don’t Hedgpeth: This is a list I got out Loftin: I can’t think of any that are really greater than any other. Hedgpeth: Seventy-nine down to eighty-nine, right through there? Loftin: Well this Thorsen Business Building, it did several things. We had this hill to contend with and no good way to get up it. So by stair stepping that building and coming out of it at the Aley Fine Art Building, that helped us get up the hill, we solved one problem but also our business division was really growing. Business was changing; construction, use and what they 36 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 were doing in business and industry, it was really changing. And that building really, we first, it sits up there on the hill like a diamond. Hedgpeth: Um hum, you can see it from coming into town on the free-way. Loftin: You can see, you know when coming in from the north you can see that building. But the faculty got to design their own building and they did an excellent job and they enjoyed using it. The kids liked it. We, the old Armory was sitting over there at one time and we had a federally funded program for welfare mothers basically, to try to teach them office skills and what have you and they wound up on the top floor up there, I don’t know where they are now, but that was a program that I had a bit of pride in. God those gals were rough, I mean their language and some of their discussions, but one gal went through that program and is now a CPA and owns her own business down here doing CPA work. So you know, you may have a drunk down here that didn’t cut it but - and you know they are there, but you also have those that what you were trying to do actually worked. So, the business building, I think, and it helped the whole community, I think there was a pride in the business community and we had people coming up who I don’t think would have come up otherwise, I really don’t. Hedgpeth: Dr. Loftin, it is 12:30, would you mind coming back to finish this? Loftin: Oh no, no. Hedgpeth: All right, we will stop it here [End of Audio Part 4] Hedgpeth: My name is Terri Hedgpeth today’s date is July 27, 2011. This is the second day of interviews with Dr. Loftin, at the Western History Center. Dr. Loftin, I have your permission to record this? Loftin: Oh yes. Hedgpeth: Perfect, yesterday we left off talking about your achievements as President of Casper College. Did you have anything further that you wanted to add to that? Loftin: Well, thinking about it last night an administrator is only as good as the people working for him. We had an excellent faculty, excellent board, and excellent administrative team. My philosophy of administration is hire the best people you can hire, give them what they need to work and leave them alone. And I tried to practice that but having a community like we have, that was so supportive of the institution, ever since I got here, that makes your job a lot easier. The institution always felt that it was necessary to meet all of the standards set up by the accrediting authorities regardless whether it was North Central, the musical group, or the nursing group, I had to make sure that we met those standards and maintained those standards. So, I 37 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 guess I feel, the fact that we got together, the faculty and the administrative team that we had, to do the job that we were supposed to do, was a great achievement but it wasn’t my achievement. It was, each one was making their own contribution, which made everything run smoothly and so I was pretty lucky. Hedgpeth: Interesting that you say that because I have heard more than one person say, and this was Mr. McCarthy, in 1987, said that you built an excellent faculty and staff at the college and I have heard others say that, Dr. Aley was the architect but you were the person who brought the faculty. Loftin: You know, I think that was our co-operative type deal. As I have said before, Tim was very interested in developing the campus. Buildings where they were needed, not just buildings for buildings, but building where we had great need and where we were expanding. I was already interested in teaching. I got a little irritated with people if they were not teaching to their capacity. Some of the discussions I had with people was really on that, I didn’t want to tell them how to teach, I just tried to get them to teach to the best of their ability and teach their discipline and we did evaluations on every instructor at least once a year, student evaluations. I remember when I got, was on an engineering instructor and we asked “what do we need?” and he said, “Well we need a swimming pool because my engineering instructor can walk on water and I would like to see it.” Well, what else can I say about that instructor, you know. Those were the kind of things that I never tried to get in any one’s face and make them feel uncomfortable but I wanted to talk to them about criticism they may have received from students, whether it was right or wrong, we wanted to discuss it. And see if we could improve the instruction if that was a legitimate message. Hiring, as I have said before, I could not hire people today where I would have to write down all these specific little things about how this person is stronger than this person, or this has weakness here and this one doesn’t. I would have real difficulty doing that, guess I could, but after interviewing a person, my navel told me yes or no and I think my navel was smarter than I was, I think, because we hired an awful lot of good people and one year, we hired 27 new people and these were new positions, they were not replacing people and that was a heck of a summer to get those people lined up but I as I felt back [then]- the ones we hired during that summer, awfully lucky. We had good candidates and the ones we hired turned out to be excellent people, so, there is a lot of luck involved in it too, but when you are dealing with human beings, but it’s easier to hire someone than it is to fire someone. I tried to impress to Division Chairs, you know, its nothing to hire someone but getting rid of them, when you don’t want them, is a pain and gets pretty scary. So, we tried to concentrate on the front end and hire people we thought would really do the job and then we didn’t have to worry about getting rid of them later on and all the trauma that would be involved in that. But, again, we had a board of trustees, they were the pillars of the community. They loved this institution and they did their job in the community to make life a lot easier up here and so it was team work all the way around. For instance, Tim, was a guy who maneuvered. He had a vision, I mean, when I came here we had three buildings and a big drainage ditch and that was 38 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 all. He had the vision, for instance, we were given a lot of land down at what is now the city dump. All sand dunes. Well what do you do with that? Well Tim started dealing with the city to trade them that, which they needed, for land next to the campus, which they owned. They are building up there now, the business building, the fine arts building, the gym, that was traded, the dump for that, the City. Mr. Morad, who the dorm is named after, gave us a piece of land out on the river, undeveloped, which is now Morad Park. That was traded to the city for land where the dormitories are now. So those were, well the city wanted their policemen educated, wanted them to have full degrees. We started that program but the trade off, no tuition, no fees but we got the land over where the theater is. So Tim had that kind of way of dealing with people to get what this institution needed. Real shroud way of doing business. So that took a lot of time and a lot of energy and so he just left me alone to do the academic bit and he took care of the expansion, and we were growing so rapidly. Now, I don’t want to make this sound like Tim’s interview but Tim Aley was the right person, at the right time, at the right place. He and the Board sued to separate from the public schools, so it became a separate legal entity. Why the Supreme Court could see that we would get State funding, that this was legal to get State funding, he helped to develop other institutions to get them off the ground. Tell those Board Members, this is the way you run an institution. So, he was sorta the father of the modern community college deal in the state. But that was his passion, that was his skill and he was a very academic man so I don’t want to say he wasn’t interested in academics, he was. He did what he really liked to do and he let me do what I like to do and I think we made a pretty good team. Hedgpeth: Sounds like it, glad you addressed Dr. Aley. It was one of my questions. Do you have any regrets or desires that you wished to accomplish while you were president that you were not able to? Loftin: I think we always go back to the four year issue. I felt and still do that it’s, well you have a monopoly in anything. The one who is holding the monopoly gets sloppy and I don’t like sloppiness in education. Someday it will come, I won’t be here. It’s going to have to come. This State is going to get more and more population and people are going to get more and more restless. I’m not saying it is going to be here. There is going to be a four year institution. Politics is going to decide where it goes, it could be Gillette, which is growing very rapidly with the Gillette College they call it now, which is actually an extension of Sheridan College. I did, I think, all I could do to convince the Board to let the University come in here less cooperatively, UWCC Center provide educational up sprints on upper division. The people in this community and in this area. And there are some people who don’t want to go to the University of Wyoming, they would prefer to come to a smaller institution where there is more personal instruction and counseling. So that is something I will always regret. Other than that, there is nothing. There is things I might want to do to expand offerings or to expand some faculty or nursing program was always a struggle. I am probably more proud of it than anything that I ever accomplished. Hedgpeth: Explain. 39 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Loftin: Well, we had, we do have an excellent hospital. The physicians and nurses we knew. Where you had one institution providing nursing students, which was the University’s four year program. It was tough for kids, potential students. Had to bundle up. Many of them married, widowed, divorced, kids all over the place and it would have been a major struggle for them to go to the University for a Four year Program. When I was delving into the two year, associate degree nursing program, I could see the real potential and in visiting with people, of course traveling with North Central, I went to the institutions that had nursing programs. So I talked to those people, how things worked, how the students, I had one thing they told me, a student can come to our two year program, highly concentrated and get their associate degree in nursing, take the State Board’s for a licensed nurse and they can go to a four year institution to finish their bachelor’s if they wish and they have something to sell. They can make a living, and I had a needed area. Well that intrigued me. We fought like the devil, Tim and I both, to try to get that accepted by the State Board. Now, one of the real problems was there were three members of the State Board, two of them were instructors at the University of Wyoming. The other had graduated from there and we met with them, our director of nursing, Tim and I, met with the State Board and they had their attorney there. They raked us over the coals. I remember about three hours and finally Tim said, “Tell us what you want us to do and we’ll do it.” They looked at their attorney and he said, “What can you say?” So they finally approved it. We again had nursing personnel that were dedicated teachers. We had some real struggles but our Psychiatric, we had to take those kids to Evanston for their Psychiatric one summer. That first class was 27 women, all of them on welfare. As I remember, it represented about 63 children. One woman had seven. So, they were, those students were dedicated or they wouldn’t have put up with some of the stuff but that having to go to Evanston, with their trying to find housing in Evanston at that time for those students, them having to farm their kids out here, they were young, and they made it. All twenty-seven of them took the State Boards and Edna Preach was our director we sweated for several weeks and finally the scores came back and Edna called me. She said the State Board’s scores are back, said I wanted to call, I don’t remember her name, the woman had six or seven kids, divorced, on welfare, she called her and I was on the other phone and she [Edna] told her [student], she said, “Board scores are back. Do you want to hear the scores, find out how you did?” She [student] said, “I don’t know.” Finally she said, “Yeah, I want to know.” Edna said, “You passed, very well.” She started crying, she said “Thank God, I’m off welfare.” That made everything worth it, that one woman, made everything worth it. All 27 passed, two of the scored higher than University Students who took the same exam at the same time. That pretty well established our program, and then we started, not just the welfare people, young girls coming in, they knew what was going on, they knew that it was a good program. We still had people coming in, men and women come in to that program, who could not do anything otherwise. I remember, it created some problems in our minds. He is now dead, this is hard. We had a big Chicano man, he was a bear. Stood about six four, six five, weighed well over three hundred pounds. They [nursing instructors] looked at me and said, “You know, what are we going to do with this?” [Loftin] We are going to teach him, give him an education. I remember one case where they were going into OB = GYN. 40 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 [Nursing Instructors] “How do we handle Jess?” I said, “Jess is going to be a nurse, just like any other nurse and he needs to be treated that way.” So old Jess went through all that program. There were many women that knew Jess, pregnant, their backs were hurting, you know, the whole bit, when they delivered, they would call for Jess. He was working at the hospital at that time. [Patients] “You’re going to turn me, I want Jess to turn me.” He went to Evanston to do the psychiatric, and he saw that those people had very little to do. They would wonder around. So each weekend, Jess was married, each weekend, he would come home, he thought of getting bicycles. He found bicycle parts frames, wheels, chains, handlebars, bagging them all over town, hauling them back, put them together. Those people rode bicycles all over that ground at Evanston. Merle Carter, who was our Psych instructor here later, was director of nursing over there. She said, “I want Jess.” He worked for them a little while, he had some marital problems and so he had to give up on that and come back over here. But he was an excellent nurse. Now you look at him and you think, you know, you draw conclusions, you shouldn’t, but Jess was an excellent nurse, they loved him at the hospital. He did special projects at the hospital. There is now a scholarship here, he died about six or eight months ago. But there is now a scholarship being formed here for Jess Platto? [spelling?]. 9:50:29 Check with Laurie Johnston maybe? I am wondering, but that program, the hospital here, many hospitals, could not really function well without that program. I don’t mean in this state, it is known wide for the product it puts out. So I am very proud of that program and have couple stars over. That’s the kind of thing you like to develop and see it grow and become a very positive thing as far as the institution in the State’s concern. Hedgpeth: Do you think that your emphases, while you were president, was different from previous and successor Casper College Presidents, and if so, Why? Loftin: Well we’ve talked about Tim and I, we had different interests. One who followed me, I can’t even think of his name – Viara, Hedgpeth: Yes, Les Viara [spelling???] Loftin: Les Viara. Les was what I referred to as a CookBook President. He liked to go to meetings, someone bring up an idea he hadn’t heard of before, then he comes back and wants to stuff it in, whether it works or not. That was his way of operating and that was his business and not mine, but of course he didn’t last very long, maybe 18 months or something like that. There was just, he could not lead the faculty. He couldn’t lead the Board. You gotta lead them too, so he was dismissed. Lee Strausner, I knew as a student. He came here, Marie Stewart, who was a dean, or an assistant dean, she loved Lee. He was such a kind person, and she just really loved him and so after he finished his degree in psychology. Taught a few years in public school, and we had an opening in psych so he made an application here and Marie insisted that he be hired. Lee was a very caring person, I say he was, he is a very caring person. When I would leave and go, say to a North Central Trip or to commission meeting, or whatever, I would always let Lee be the acting 41 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 President, cause he wanted to be president someday. And so I thought I would give him a taste and what have you and he wanted to do it. Lee was very student oriented, and I don’t think he was as attached to instructional things as I was, but he was interested in students as students and their progress and so he had heavy emphasis on counseling, testing and that type of stuff as far as the students were concerned. That’s about it, I have no way of judging what’s going on here. I am detached from it. When I became President, Tim moved down the hall to the next office and there were some faculty that loved him and didn’t care for me and so they would go to Tim, instead of coming to me as President. I don’t think Tim ever did anything to undercut me at all. But when I decided to retire, I said, “I’m not coming back up here.” I’d go to plays, ball games and I came up and got insurance forms once. Otherwise, I have never been here. Well some building dedications, I was invited to, like extension of this dedication of this building and so forth. But I am convinced in my own mind, when they hire a new president, that’s it, you go home. You stay home and let the guy run the joint. I have done that, and I recommended it to Lee when he retired, “Don’t go back up there, it’s none of your business anymore.” That’s sort of a thing of mine, when I quit something, I quit it. When I went out of public schools and to college, I never went back to my high school once. I finished college, rah, rah, sis boom bah, I was over. Military, I served my time, I served my country then it was over. So that has just been my belief, my attitude, and so that is what happened here. When I retired from that job, I wasn’t President anymore and I was not an employee anymore so stay away and let people run the joint. That’s about all I can see, there are probably things going on that I don’t know nothing about, but that’s, it was none of my business anyway. And, the Boards, I worked for the Board, I was never close to the Board otherwise, so there was no socialization or anything other than that, once I retired. We were friendly, there were no animosities anywhere and that was fine, that was great, but I was never so close to the board that there was any socialization taking place. Hedgpeth: With the growth of Casper College from seventy-three students in 1945 to almost two thousand in 1985, when you were President, what do you see are the strengths of Casper College and how do you view this student growth? Loftin: Well, one of the things that we worked at real hard was continuing education. It’s one of the leg of the stool of community college, was continuing education. We worked very hard at it, Joe Stewart was, we made him the Evening School, we call it the Evening School Director and we had a lot of people from the community come up here and take courses. We insisted that students be enrolled in the evening as well. We insisted that full time instructors do some teaching in the evening school. So that the community could see them and they could see the community. I had one instructor that wanted to teach only at night. He loved the mix of the full time students and the continuing education student. We didn’t allow it but that shows that some of the dynamics that was going on. We had a large population of evening school students. We had a number of kids in high school or that had just finished high school that would come at night to try to get a start, get a taste, and then sometime later, when they felt they were ready, would come into full time. So that was, and I think that contact with the community and the community with us and it was just 42 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 before I got here but this is just an example, the year before I got here, three major oil companies left this community. One went to Ohio and two went to Tulsa, Oklahoma. Moved their people completely, which was a real blow to the economy of this community. The one bond issue that we gave, I wasn’t here but was given at that time, the only one during my tenure, passed something like eleven to one. It was a pretty good size bond issue at the time and then the economy that was in force when the board and Tim, asked them to support. One of the reasons why we had that kind of vote, where people knew they could come up here and were coming up here and receiving instructions, full time instructors in many cases and they appreciated it and they were willing to suck it up and pay through the nose. That was taxes to the, it was because they were proud of the institution and wanted to, wanted to keep going. We’re convinced that what was going on with the community, the people who voted, the people who paid, was a real strength and growth factor as far as the institution was concerned. I know things change, I know the commission didn’t want to fund it for instance. About the time I got ready to retire the commission didn’t want to fund that, let it pay for itself. But, it was one of the missions and I think one of the missions that really added to strength of and power of this institution. I think working with groups who were not necessarily collegiate levels and some that were, but were technical level, police, fire, EMT, a number of these kind of things I think showed the community and the EMT that this was pretty well state wide; environmental sciences, water, sewer, these are things that are needed in the state no one else was doing it and so getting into those kind of things, I think, always adds to the strength of the institution and shows its dedication to what it is supposed to be doing. I think that probably is- Of Course just having good daily instruction, summer school and always shooting for quality. That always adds to the strength of an institution. Hedgpeth: You said that continuing education was one of the legs of the footstool of a community college, what are the others? Loftin: Well academic, full time academics, continuing education, the academic, and then the trades or technical type of things, but then and community service and continuing education. A Junior College by definition is a first two years instruction, that first two years, before the senior or University level. Same stuff, same books, same approach. Community College has extinction [think he meant distinction], it serves that, that’s one leg, but it also has continuing education, technical education and community service. So announcers to football irked me, oh he is just a Jr. College transfer, well you know that is fine. Rodman who will be in the hall of fame was one of those, you know, in basketball, and it irks me, mainly because of the ignorance. Because it, Tom Brokaw was a community college graduate, he did pretty well. You know it is my own personal bias but those things bother me, because by definition, you know it’s like calling Ohio State University a college. But anywayHedgpeth: I know what you mean, I went two years, full time, at a college, and met my husband and then for the next 17 years, it took me 17 years to get my bachelor’s but I would not have gone and got my bachelor’s if I did not get my associates from Gulf Coast Community College, 43 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 that was one of those things, I have to, I have to see some progress here. That is what I worked towards and once I saw that progress, I can do this. I can continue. Loftin: You know, in many cases and I think we have students that come here and think this is a little less than, but then they see this is challenging they meet people who go on and do very well at a senior institution. So it sort of wakes them up a bit and gives them confidence that they can go on, you know, we can name a number of people who went through here that did very well. I know one kid, you look at him when he came here, a big tall gangly kid, you know, he is now a Doctor, a PHD,at John Hopkins. He is one of the world renounced physicians, in child’s AIDS. Well, you know I could name a couple that are in prison two but you know you take them all, the point being, and I had a number of those kids come back and say “I don’t care I been-“ some of them MD’s, what have you, come back and say “The best instruction I ever had was here.” There’s guy who is at Texas A & M, about ready to retire, he went here. Math and engineering and he is a researcher to Von Kluch Institute in Germany as well as working at Texas A & M and he still comes here [Casper] to talk, to promote, and he would like to see this be a four year school. He does everything he can because he says it would be one of the best, because of the attitude. And, you know there is a number of people there, that are common people, they haven’t, they are not MD’s or PHD’s or what have you. But they are well educated people adding to the community, adding to the State, and they got started right here. Hedgpeth: It sounds like a lot of your former students, or students that were here while you were president have come back and contacted you. Loftin: Well a number of them have, I meet a few you know, down town, or, what have you and while I was still working, a number of them would drop by just a little bit. I ran into one down in Mesa, Arizona. I had him as a freshman in Zoology and he is now retired, and they are living in Mesa, and they get the Wyoming people together, basically Casper people together once a year for a little deal, you know, eat and visit. He showed up a year ago, two years ago and so when they mentioned his name, I said “Yeah, I had him as a student in zoology.” He came over to me and shook my hand and he said, “Dr. Loftin, when I took zoology from you, you almost ruined my college education.” But he said, “I wasn’t applying myself very well, was I?” But he made it, he was a business man here. So got all levels, you know and various experiences with people, former instructors have come back and visited and so it always good to see those people and know that you had them in your life. Hedgpeth: You were President when Casper Mountain road was re-routed and the Armory was torn down. How did you deal with this and the ties that the college has with the community? Loftin: The Armory was a real problem, it was extremely expensive to operate the Armory. It was situated in the wrong place for efficiency and we worked with the City Council to try to get something resolved there. The Historical Society wanted it as a big museum and we said, “You know, how are you going to fund it? How are you going to operate it? You are going to have to 44 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 have insurance, you are going to have to-” you couldn’t heat the darned thing, I mean it was like a sieve, your heat, you could see heat just go out the windows, roof and every place else. So anyway we were trying to deal with the City, we knew it was a touchy thing but there was a city councilman that literally hired a person to come up here, a crew to come up here, and all of a sudden it was gone. Caused quite a stink in the community, we wanted it gone, we wanted to replace it someway but we weren’t interested in taking that approach, but anyway, it was gone. We needed land to the East for expansion; we didn’t want a major highway splitting the campus. We had tradeoffs that we wanted to make with the City. We wanted to move the road as far east as they could, it is a little swampy, over the base of that hill, so that created a problem. I met with two councilmen and was pleading to work this thing out so we could move that road east and one of the councilmen said, “Well, what I would prefer to do is you go ahead and build your campus buildings over there and the city will build an overpass so the students can come over and I said, “Well, there is one built on the east side of town, and people walk a half mile to get around it, they don’t want to use it. What do you do with handicap?” Anyway, I threw out several things and we finally made a deal. This councilman didn’t like the deal but we had enough councilmen that did. Finally through tradeoffs, we acquired that land and the city, it was eventually county, went ahead and developed the road on that side. We also tried to get the YMCA considered in their routing and also, the people, there were about four or five houses down here that we wanted it routed so that it didn’t go right in front of their house but would swing out towards campus. It was a lot of work but in our mind it had to be done because we wanted a complete campus, not divided, not have a dangerous route coming through here, I didn’t want that unsightly overpass which knowing students, they would have walked all the way downtown to get around the darned thing. But anyway that is what got them to, I think everyone was pretty well satisfied with it. We need more land, “we” I am not here anymore. The college needs some more land and I have recommended a couple of things but I don’t think it will ever come about. I saw the University of Oklahoma, they had a neat little campus which was about four blocks surrounded by little old houses all the way around. Had no place to go. After, well starting after World War II but then the Korean War, they demanded, they knew we were trying to build up but how far up can you go? And then they started buying little houses and you would have thought they were mansions. What it was costing them to buy up out blocks of houses in order to expand their campus were is was necessary. And I have seen others same way, they get land locked and I don’t know where we are going to go from here. We’ve owned land, the College owns land, course onto the South but to develop ingress and egress to develop student movement would be terribly expensive if not impossible. It would be very inconvenient. Hedgpeth: Any thoughts on your replacement Les Viara. Loftin: No, I knew Les, barely. I took no part, at all, in hiring of my replacement. Again that’s Board function and should be Board function. Les was assistant to the President of University of Alaska or one of them up there someplace, but I only met Les about three times. They had a board had a welcoming dinner for he and his wife, I went to that. He took me to lunch one time 45 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 and wanted to know about people who were in Administrative group, what was my assessment of those people. That was it. I will say I had a number of instructors come to my house and want to know what I might be able to do to correct a few things. One said to me, the Board is going to let this institution go down the toilet because of him. I said, “Don’t undersell the Board, they hired the guy, they are going to give him a chance. They are going to give him a good chance to succeed.” And if it doesn’t work, he will be gone. And that’s what happened. I don’t know what was going on. It is none of my business but we gave him a chance and he was not performing to their standards and so they released him. That is about all I know of it. Hedgpeth: Okay, what is your view of Casper College today? [Remember this is the year 2011] Loftin: Well there are some things, you know, things have changed. I have not been here really to see the changes and know the philosophy, the reasoning, why certain things were changed the way they are. I am impressed with the building program right now. I think where they are building some of these things shows we need more property. But, we still have people coming through here, well the UWCC program is doing what I had envisioned and tried to convince the board. I think this is the way it will work. I think bringing in other institutions in specialty areas, other four year institutions strengthens the college and gives opportunities to segments of the community that would have real difficulty getting that education otherwise. I like that. I have met, oh I’ve come to retirement programs with Randy, Randy was my good buddy. I came to his retirement party and listening to some of the instructors. I sat at a table with four or five of them and visited with them. I was very impressed. The quality of the individual, the, you can just feel the intellect seeping out of those people as you visited with them. I think we have some people here, I wonder why we have them. Unruh, for instance, a tremendous individual. A real prize and we have had others that way but you wonder what do we have that makes a person of that quality and that, well he is a great individual, a great musician, what do we have that keeps that person here and happy? We had another musician, a young woman, pianist, tremendous. She had played in Moscow, you know, she was a concert pianist but she came here to teach and she did an excellent job. I wish she had stayed. But, you know, what I see is still the search for that quality of instructor, the quality of administrator. A person who’s- I mean, I see the same thing kinda going on that Tim tried to develop, that I tried to develop and Lee tried to develop. I see it is still here and I don’t know why. I know part of it, the legislature wouldn’t fund it, and the commission wouldn’t fund it. I worry about continuing education. I know they have a deal here and I know some people who have gone through them, the adults, they are very happy with it. A short types of things, very specific in what they are doing. But I always had a pride in our evening school and I see that slipping away. That bothers me. The building program, and I see it right now, they are doing, for instance the dorms we built were built at a time when all a kid would bring, maybe he would have a radio to plug in and that was about- well occasionally one would slip in a hot plate but those dorms had to be replaced because they were retarding instruction, learning and they were becoming dangerous. 46 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 I mean kids had refrigerators, Television sets and everything you could think of that was electrical. Their computers, you know they tried to jack-leg some stuff in there so they could hook up their computers, we could have computer access with them, but it was not sufficient. So, I don’t know what’s in that dorm but I assume it is wired for everything. WIFI the whole bit because it is a necessity today. This building is going to get less and less and less use, which bothers me. What I said yesterday, to me this is the center of education on this campus. It should be. But when you pick up your IPad, or even your telephone download any book you want and use it in the privacy and probably when you are driving, but that availability of everything. The internet! I have talked to some English teachers that just pulling their hair, History teachers. You can download your theme, you can download your history research, have it printed out and turn it in and you didn’t do anything but push little buttons. So that becomes a problem, I think, in education but that is, that’s today, that’s the future. The institution has to go with that. It’s like Mahatma Gandhi said, “There are my people, I must go for I am their leader.” Well that’s the way the institution is. We gotta go where learning and education and commerce will have you going. We have to go there and we should lead them, education has problems with being the leader because it takes time to develop what needs to be developed. To stay up with business and industry and peoples’ needs. As I see the institution, the Alumni Association, I am proud we developed that thing. Tim said “you can’t do it,” which spurred me on. We got it done and I think it is a viable part of this institution and so I am glad we got that started and its development so when people have pride in what’s happened to them and where they have been it can only help the college, community, what have you. Hedgpeth: Upon your retirement you said you were going to do quite a few things. Have you been able to do any of those things when you retired? Loftin: No, well many of them I have not. The reason I retired, I wanted two or three more years but in about 86, early 86 I came to work, I had a headache. I had a heck of a headache and I came to work and my vision became blurred and I called Paul, he was my Administrative Assistant, called Paul and said, “Would you take me to the eye doctor, I can’t see well enough to drive, there is something wrong.” So he takes me to my eye doctor and he took one look and he said “I want you to go to this guy over here, this other doctor.” I go over there, he takes one look and he calls a surgeon in Denver. I had a detached retina. The retina was actually folded over and I was just seeing a green patch and I could see a little below it, in my left eye. So my wife bundled me up, she had never driven in Denver but anyway, we got to the Hospital in Denver and I had surgery that night. The retina was about 2/3 detached. This guy is known all over this part of the country as a real retina surgeon. Anyway he went in and put in a scleral buckle, which is a silicone strap they put around the eye ball and then tighten it. They call it “putting a waist on the eyeball.” That decreases the internal capacity, pushes the- well anyway he got it attached. Its procedure and I was flat on my back for about three weeks, in a dark room. Paul and my secretary, reading things to me, I was trying to respond. I couldn’t see. Well we went through that and everything was going real well and I thought everything was straightened out. I was at the play one night and I started seeing what I referred to as a single ring bulls eye. Which are- are 47 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 the floaters, the actual red blood cells that give you the appearance of a little bulls eye. Thousands of them. And I leaned over to Bev and I said, “I got the same problem in the other eye.” We bundled up and they called the doctor, so we headed for Denver and the young physician that was his assistant said “Let’s do cryo-surgery first.” (Cryopexy- surgery that freezes the area and seals a tear on the retnia). So he froze an area down there and said “Now come back in the morning and we will see how it works.” I came back the next morning and he said, “Well that worked, but it is split up on top.” He said “You are going to have to have surgery again.” So I went through surgery again and there I was three weeks or so, flat on my back in a dark room, Paul doing my work, helping me get my work done. My Secretary doing all this stuff and I got back, that was late in the year and I had a commencement coming up. I asked the Superintendent of Schools if she would give the commencement address. “Oh Yeah.” Well years before, I am digressing, but years before, I told Libby, “I need a commencement address, in a file.” So I developed one and she put it in a file. Well anyway, I got a phone call. We had already gone through commencement practice. I got a phone call, she couldn’t get out of Washington, D. C. She could get here but it would be about nine- o’clock at night. So, I well I dig in there and I remembered the address, I said to Libby, “Get me that commencement address.” She looked and looked and finally found it. I gave that commencement address and I could hardly see it. But we got through it, but that convinced me that I was a detriment, really a detriment to this institution. I could not do the job for which I was hired. So I visited with the wife about it, we had a little place at the lake, and we were out there and I said “Bev, I think we need to retire.” She said, “Why?” I said, “I’m not doing- not able to do what I should be doing as far as the college is concerned.” She said, “Well, it is your decision.” So I thought about it some more and then I went to the Board after one of the Board meetings and I tendered my resignation. They asked “Why?” I said, “Well” I told them the same thing I told Bev I said, “You’re not getting your money’s worth. I cannot, I’m taking up other peoples’ time that should be doing something else for the college to help me do my job,” and so I said “You’re getting cheated so I’m out of here.” My Board President said “Are you afraid of the University?” That’s when we were just developing the UWCC. “Are you afraid of the University”? he said. I said, “No that would be fun, that would be a treat, that’s not it,” I said, “I gave you my reason.” So at the end of that year, I retired. I didn’t want to, there were some other things I thought needed to be done and I wanted to do them but anyway, that ended that part of my life. Hedgpeth: Did you spend some time, you said you were going to go on a walking tour of England, Scotland, Wales, and learn to play the guitar. Write. Loftin: Well I tried the guitar, but I was developing arthritis in my hand so I gave that up. The wife and I traveled an awful lot. We belonged to a travel club out of Denver that owned their own airplanes and the whole bit. 48 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Hedgpeth: Wow. Loftin: And I told the wife yesterday, “I would like to go back to Keswick, up in the Lake District again (located in the UK), not this time on a tour but just to get out and walk. We feel at home in the British Isles, we never had a moment of trepidation. Loved the Lake District. I love London. I don’t like people, I really don’t like people but in London, very little crime. Pickpocketing is about the only crime they put up with. We walked, the first day we walked 18 miles. Worn out, but here is all this history. Having lived through World War II, and the Battle of Britain and all that. I saw so many things, I have read a lot of English History. My mother was Welch, my name is Lloyd, my younger brother is Floyd, Floyd Eldon. My older brother is Wilbur. They are all Welch names. If you ask my mother, “What are you?” She said, “I’m American.” But somewhere in her, she got that Welch out and our names reflect that. When I was in Wales, I had a good time in Wales, I felt like it was home. The Welch people are very common and down to earth, music loving individuals and I got to see a lot of Druid stuff. If you don’t care, I will tell you a story. But anyway, Ireland, I was very disappointed in Ireland. I felt sorry for Ireland, when we were there, it was the second poorest country in the European Union. So I felt very sorry for the people. And everything was run down, people were sad, so I didn’t really get a good picture, I don’t think of Ireland. Scotland, I love Scotland. We traveled to Scotland several times. Once we took Bev’s dad to Scotland. Edinburgh, we go there two days after the Tattoo (a ceremony performed by Military Musicians http://www.edinburghtattootickets.com/edinburgh-military-tattoo-history.html#.VGEDmPnF8c8 ) and I always wanted to go to that, to the Irish Tattoo, but anyway we didn’t make that one. But, you know to be around Bobby Burns’ walking’s and oh, the Scottish people have always intrigued me with their independence. Their drive, their verve, you know I just love them, so we had a lot of fun in Scotland. We took a trip this last year, a boat trip, from Switzerland to Holland and I always wanted to go to Europe. I had never been before and that, I got to go past a place where my brother crossed the Rhine River on the Remagen Bridge (bridge built in WWI) but it was in the river just then so we got to crawl over the framework but I felt a special feeling as our boat went past the point where I knew he stood there defending his country. Canada, we have traveled a lot in Canada. I have never been to Mexico, nor do I want to. We have traveled quite a bit in Canada. So we have done a lot of traveling. And when I retired, we took off and I remember, I said “we are going to take our time on this trip, we are going to take month. We are going to take our time.” Well we drove seven hundred miles the first day and she said “I’m sure glad we’re taking it easy.” But anyway, we went up through Minnesota, into Canada, all the way across Canada, back down to Niagara Falls and up through New York, Maine and all the way down the coast to Florida, and then back up through Arkansas and then back home. Tiring trip but I had never been to that part of the country and so I enjoyed going through the East. And I’m a Civil War buff so I got to see quite a few things on that trip that I had read about and to the Revolution Era so I got to see quite a bit of that. Got to Hawaii finally, my granddaughter got married and had to get married in Hawaii so we visited three islands while we were there. Other things, I didn’t get to do a lot of things I 49 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 wanted to study the grasses of Wyoming and never got around to it. I look at them, and what have you, think about them, and compare them. I was educated in Illinois which is the, and lived there for many years, which was the Great Plains. Reading about grass, andropogons (genus of grasses), that you could stand on your horse back and barely see over the top of the grass. Well I studied grass, it is one of the things that I studied was the grass at 10:39:53 Edgerton Park. But I have always had a love of grasses, I’ve got a bunch of them at my place right now that I am trying to develop but I never did really get to study them the way I wanted to. No, I didn’t do a lot of things, part of them was because I was having health problems. I had, well we retired in ’91 and I had colon cancer, had surgery resection. I had a six-way by-pass, still have some eye problems, not as bad but I developed Chromes disease and took about, oh almost two years to get that diagnosed and then after that to get it under control. So part of it, I’m lazy I guess. Hedgpeth: I don’t think so! Loftin: Part of it, you know I have had some health problems, and I told the wife, that it was a good thing I retired or I would have ignored all these things. Which I would have. Then they caught up with me. No, we’ve developed little place at the lake bought a boat. The old saying is “A boat owner is happy twice in his life. Once when he buys it and once when he sells it.” But we have a lot of fun out of it. The kids, the grandkids particularly, have a lot of fun with it. Have a little house out there, and have enjoyed developing it and building decks and all that kind of stuff. But, I think when you are living your life retired or otherwise, you kinda go where you are led and you don’t get to do everything that you want to do. And I didn’t. But I’m not done yet. Hedgpeth: Not yet, not yet, those grasses are still there. I want to go back, you mentioned yesterday morning when we started, and you just mentioned two of your brothers, how many siblings did you have? Loftin: Two brothers, I had an older brother and a younger brother. The older brother, six years older, he, we didn’t get along too well, as kids, as kids don’t. I remember one time when a little buddy of mine, who was a brother to my brother’s buddy and we wanted to tag around with them and we said, “We ought to play detective.” And they said, “Okay”. Well, we were living out in the country and I said we lived out in a camp, an oil camp, and they said, “Well, we will tie you up and then you can get untied and see if you can find us.” Well they tied us up and put us in a meter shed, which is an old tin shed where meter goes through, gas line, and they tied us very well. We had a heck of a time getting out of there but just little things like that, but anyway, we were not overly close. He graduated and wanted to go to college, but he got a job, got married and then I remember, we were in Church, Mom didn’t go, the three of us went Dad, Wilbur and I and we drove in the drive-way, mother leaned out the kitchen window and said, “The Japanese just bombed Pearl Harbor.” The next morning, bright and early, my brother got up and drove to the county seat and enlisted. I saw him, maybe twice, between then and 1945. He was with Patton’s third army, went over the Remagen Bridge, then they bundled him up, he was over in Europe, but they bundled up two divisions, who had been in 50 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 combat, severe combat, gave them thirty day’s leave, put them on a boat on V-J day he was at Iwo Jima, and they were to invade Japan. He came back, by then he had his little daughter, and Dad wanted him to go to college on the GI bill and he said, I have a family, my obligations to my family, I can’t do it. He would have been a good one, he would have been a good one. He went through pilot training and then the bulls broke out, they pulled all those guys out and put them back in the infantry. So he was no dummy, he was a smart guy. He made more money by accident, than I did on purpose. He worked for Exxon, in off-shore drilling. He was sent to the North Sea, he helped develop housing on platforms, because he knew what people wanted. My younger brother was an individual that I often think he was sired by somebody else. He was so different. He was eleven years younger than me, but as an example, when he went into high school, we had a four year high school in that community. When he went into a freshman to enroll as a freshman, he handed his councilor a list of courses he wanted to take, the teachers he wanted. The teacher said, “Why, why are you going through this?” He said, “I want to go to the Missouri School of Mines of Metallurgy, get my degree in metallurgy and I want to work for Reynolds Metals in Richmond, Virginia. That’s he did. I mean Bam, bam, bam, and then he got his Master’s well, he went through ROTC at the same time. He did a four year metallurgical program, plus ROTC in four years. It was a five year program, so needless to say he very bright boy. He worked for Reynolds’s Metal, he retired from Reynolds. Still living in Richmond. Those are my brothers, we are very close now, and my oldest brother lives in Lafayette, Indiana, and retired from Exon. So that’s my brothers. Hedgpeth: Is there anything else that you would like to add to this interview, that we haven’t covered? Loftin: No, I guess the only thing that I feel is that I left with things undone. And I think most people probably do that. You will probably do that, because you still have things that you’ve got an itch and you haven’t been able to scratch. But you know that you can’t do it, and you walk off and try to find something else. I’ve enjoyed my retirement, other than all the surgeries and what have you that I have had to put up with but I made it through it so thank God for that. We enjoy our winters, we go to Arizona, have for 21 years. We own a house or a Condo, on the golf course. Don’t play golf, neither of us but it is a nice big back yard and I don’t have to maintain it. I try to enjoy my kids, grandkids, and my great grandkids. But I don’t want to interfere with their lives. My oldest son runs a construction company, owns a construction company and it is very successful. My younger son got his degree in power electricity, and electronics and he had worked for Western Power Authority ever since he graduated. Two daughters, very precious, one of them happens to be a nurse. She just passed the test to be a charge nurse. She works at the University Hospital, the University Of Utah Hospital, in Salt Lake. The Nurse has a daughter and she is something else. I have two grandsons, the oldest son, one has a little boy who is a pistol. My daughter, unfortunately, is bi-polar and she has some real problems still but she is coping alright. She is finally realizes that she has to be on her medications, and she is on them now and things are working out reasonably well. She lives just north of Salt Lake. So those are the people I try to keep up with too, the wife’s family. Of Course, I am very close to them. And of course 51 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 one is going through problems with breast surgery and she has two kids. A little girl three years old, she is something else, she is afraid of me but she likes to boss me around. As far as the relatives are concerned, I guess they are scattered around, here and yon but I got away from them. That’s about it, I guess. I just keep watching this place and things that are taking place that we kinda thought about and so many people in the community kinda urged us that way and that is what you’re doing. I was thinking last night, I remember I was writing grant proposals and I had an instructor, English instructor, come to me and she was from Riverton, born and lived in Riverton and she had gone to one of the big blowouts that they have on the reservation and Carolyn came back and she liked to sit and visit anyway, she said, “I went to this and all that I could think of, I could see these older people, some of them that could not speak English, they spoke Shoshoni or whatever. Young kids that didn’t look, didn’t dress, I mean they were dressing like in Riverton or Lander or here, she said, “What we are losing, as those people die off, we are losing a part of our culture,” and she said, “It bothers me.” Well, I thought about it quite a while and finally I wrote a proposal, it was to NEA- no, anyway Arts, Federal Arts, proposal to buy a small Winnebago, the front part of it would be where we could have interviews, the back part, the bedroom, the toilet, the little kitchen, the rest of it so we could drive around the State. Contact historical Societies, County Historical Society, have them contact people that they think would add to the history and culture of the State. I had instructors and I talked about it, Carolyn talked about it, wanted to do this on their own time, weekends, whatever. And I was turned down. The University got it and they published a little book which is an inane outfit, but anyway, they got the grant. I didn’t. That’s always bothered me but at least this is helping to make up for that type of thing. Hedgpeth: If we can continue, absolutely. Loftin: You know as a biologist, when you die the brain is mush. The soul lives on, and what is lost. It is a tragedy that I think of my dad and my mother. I sent my dad a tape recorder one time and a whole box of tapes. I said, “Dad you sit down sometime and talk about your childhood, your work, you know, your growing up, your marriage and your family.” After he died, I found it still in the box. But the stories that guy would tell about his life, his work, but that happens in every life. It’s gone, we lose some richness in our culture, in our community that is gone forever. And I know you feel that or you wouldn’t be here. But that is one of the things that I guess, really bug me. All the rest, like I was Dean of Faculty then, when I was writing those proposal and that’s bugged me ever since and it still does. And I say, I’m glad to see this and I know some of the others, or I’m assuming some of the others, I think I’ve heard that they’re doing- trying to do the same thing. Hedgpeth: We have a whole list of potential interviews, you’re on the list. Loftin: I have been on several lists. [Laughs] 52 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 Hedgpeth: This is a good list, you are on it. It’s finding time, finding people to do the interviews and convincing members of the community that this is necessary. Loftin: Yes, I’m sure that is true. Hedgpeth: Just like we talked about yesterday afternoon, convincing Miss Mary Alice. [Hedgpeth] “I want to talk to you.” [Mary Alice] “Oh yeah, I’ve nothing to say.” [Hedgpeth] “Yes, you do.” Loftin: Oh I know, I know. She is a very private person. Dick was just the opposite, outgoing, but Mary Alice is a very quiet, close individual and I’ve known her for a many, many years. I would like to sit down, you know more people around here than I do, and I would like to sit down and try to think of some people that, I think could add to what you are trying to. Hedgpeth: When we are done here, I can show you our list. Loftin: Okay, good Hedgpeth: Yeah absolutely. Are we done here? Loftin: I guess so, I have rambled all over the place. Hedgpeth: Well I think you’ve done an excellent interview, having your personal history and getting your experience and what led you to Casper College. Loftin: You know, I think I have to mention this, if anyone ever asked me “Who had the most influence on your life,” it would have to be my parents, though I have met a lot of influential people but I think the ones that really established me into the person I am, was my mom and dad. My dad was a hard working fool, and he expected you to work. Some of my earliest memories are being in the garden hoeing weeds. I remember, I went to church, we always went to church, anyway, the sermon was based on “If you have faith, you will move mountains.” That bothered me and we were going home and I was leaning over the front seat, Dad was driving, and I said “Dad, how in the world, do you really think if you had enough faith, you could move the Arbuckle Mountains,”, which was mountains in Southern Oklahoma, which was the biggest one I had ever seen. He said “Yeah.” I said, “Dad I have problems with that. I don’t see how in the world, me, If I had that faith, I could move those mountains.” Dad said “Look, if you have enough faith, you’re going to move those mountains if you have to get a shovel and a wheel barrow to move them.” Well, you know I was probably seven years old but it hit home and that’s the way I was taught, morality, work ethics, what have you. My mother was a very kind, sweet, hard working woman and I probably spent more time and talked more with my mother than with my dad because my dad worked. They established my 53 �WyCaC WHC 1989.002.010 Casper College Western History Center Oral History Cooperative WHCOH011 whole moral structure, my ethics and I have to say they were the greatest influence on my life and I think I could say the same for my brothers. Just hard working common people that went out and did what had to be done. I was taught by parables and - well I’m wasting your tape. Hedgpeth: No way! I think we did an excellent job here and thank you very much Dr. Loftin for coming in. Loftin: I appreciate your interest in it and I don’t know what I have contributed but as I say, I have this feeling that there is so much out there that we need to preserve and I applaud you for the work you are doing here. Hedgpeth: We thank you, we are trying. [Audio Part 5 ends] 54 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Western History Center at Casper College Oral History Cooperative Transcripts Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. The digital files in this collection may be reused as long as attribution is made to its original source. Educational or fair uses of this material are free. Commercial uses require a publication agreement. Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 2011-07-26 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Western History Center at Casper College Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Western History Center at Casper College Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Transcript of an Oral Interview with Dr. Lloyd Loftin, Casper College President, 1961-1979 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC-EDU/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC-EDU/1.0/</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Western History Center at Casper College Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Dr. Loyd Loftin, President of Casper College, 1961-1979 Teri Hedgpeth, Western History Center Archivist Date Created Date of creation of the resource. 7/26/2011 Type The nature or genre of the resource Text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource PDF Language A language of the resource ENG Access Rights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. Access Rights may include information regarding access or restrictions based on privacy, security, or other policies. This digital file may be reused as long as attribution is made to its original source. Educational or fair uses of this material are free. Commercial uses require a publication agreement.