Frank Tepe

FT: Noel? Well, I started as an undergraduate student here in 1956. And I got my bachelor’s and my master’s here. And then I went to, well I was one of the faculty before I left, I went to University of Michigan, and I stayed there for two years. And then I came back here. And so probably, I’d here on the staff, I was a research assistant after I got my undergraduate degree. So I guess you could consider that would be 1961. And I retired 94—94. So 33 years I was on the staff or faculty. I joined the faculty, I think 64 if I remember, right, yeah. Okay.

NO: So what basically he brought you here, right? Yeah. Is it? Is it?

FT: Well, back then, in high school, we used to take a test, and it would tell you what, what you should go to what I do. And mine said I should either be a pilot, or air, or an engineer. Okay. So I put the two together and became an aeronautical engineer.

NO: Yeah. Okay. All right. So I want to know, I want to know some things you’re passionate about. Something you possibly want to share with us. Yeah, what are you passionate about? Were are you passionate about piloting and like? You just said an aeronautical engineer? And were you like passionate about it? Or?

FT: Passionate about? Well, the co-op program.

NO: Okay.

FT: At the University is one of the things that attracted me here, because neither of my parents went to college. And we were not wealthy by a longshot. I knew I had to pay my own way to college. And the co-op program, I felt gave me a way to do that. It worked very well. Of course, the tuition was a lot less when I went to undergraduate school here. We went. In engineering, we went three, eight week terms, it was $330 for terms of less than $1,000 a year, a lot less than it is now gross pay wasn’t as good as it is now. So it all evened out.

NO: Okay, so um, what do you what? What did you want to teach? Like, what did you

FT: Engineering, I was interested in engineering. And I was kind of interested in going into administration too which I did after a number of years. I was an Aero department and after I got my undergraduate degree, a new department head came in named Paul Harrington, and he asked me if I would stay on they had a research contract at Wright Patterson Air Force Base. And he asked me if I’d stay on and I did and never left. I had two job offers one in California one in Texas. I put them on hold for two years, but I never got out of school. Never left.

NO: Okay, so you teaching engineering, can you describe how like, the classes where it’s you and like, what did you hope your students would learn from and will take away? And also did you have like, any favorite students who want to show this to?

FT: No. Too numerous to mention. But I enjoyed teaching I enjoyed—it kept me young and I enjoyed teaching. I taught fluid mechanics lead to stability, control a number of other courses, when you’re, you’re coming into department, you always get to the courses nobody else wants just for a few years, you know, until you get get some seniority. So I taught most of the courses. But I just enjoyed teaching. Once I went into administration in about 1993, I guess. I continued to teach but I was traveling so much that it was difficult. And I felt guilty having my graduate assistant teach so I stopped teaching. Why just in about 1983 or 84. But I felt like—I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the students are enjoyed to feedback from the students. Majority especially when I was started, are very few women in engineering. And I enjoyed the Women in Engineering a lot because I what I found is a lot of the young men that come into engineering, they go into engineering because their father was an engineer or their grandfather was an engineer. And they really just pushed into it. Where the girls coming in. They wanted to be an engineer. Were always much more enthusiastic, we didn’t have many, but the ones that I had, they were very good, very good students. And hopefully it still continued. Now the number of ladies in engi—I have a daughter as an engineer. We encouraged her. So that I enjoyed teaching the ladies very much because of their enthusiasm for engineering.

NO: Yeah, I remember looking in one of the 1969 yearbooks, and I—there were like so many guys are just one girl.

FT: Right? Oh, the girls back then were either in chemical engineering, our civil engineer, I don’t know why, but that—we didn’t have any in Aero when I graduated. Well, we only had our graduating class was only 17, I think, but we didn’t have a whole lot of people back then now in Aero, I think add about 100 a year. So it’s completely different now much larger. Good.

NO: So, um, so would you want to take us through your hiring process, like, how you were hired, like the story, if there’s any interesting story about your hiring process?

FT: But hiring? Or?

NO: Hiring, like getting into the university? Like, they’re like? {FT laughs]

FT: Well, I guess the department had Paul Harrington helped me a lot. He knew I was interested in administration. And he had a friend George Lee, was his name, was director of research. And he had a medical problem. He was out of his office for several months. And Dr. Harrington talked to the President, who is Walker length of time, and they appointed me is a acting director of research. I sort of, for three months, I sort of really got interested then. So when I came back from Michigan, in 1970, I guess it was. In 73, when Warren Bennis, 72, or 73, when Warren Bennis was the president, he appointed Guy Stern, if the first title was the university, Dean for Research, and Advanced Studies. Long name. And Guy hired me as an assistant University Dean takes care of the research aspects of that. And that’s sort of what developed and then they hired—when guy left, he went to Wayne State, if I remember, right, they hired [unknown], we had hired a fella by the name of Al Gates, who is an associate University Dean. And then when Guy left, Al was appointed University our went on to become president of the University of Colorado State, Colorado State University. And Al’s done very, very well. He’s retired now. So I just continued on and then when 1990 Ewell Bingham had taken out of place when he left to go— he went to Washington state of I remember, right. And when Ewell retired, they appointed me as the interim vice president, knowing I was going to retire in a few years, that was 1990. So for three years, I was the interim vice—well then they changed the title, the Vice President for Research, and university Dean for Advanced Studies. I don’t know why they just as long names. They do. And I did that doctor retired in 19—well, step down 93 and I retired in 94.

NO: Okay.

FT: So I guess one of the most interesting things that happened to me when I was in that position was that even when I was an associate vice president, the research institutes reported to me. Al set it up that way. And one of the institute’s reported to me was the Institute of engineering and medicine. And Neil Armstrong was the director of that

NO: Oh the astronaut?

FT: And well, I team taught a course with Neil Armstrong to which was very interesting. From the point of view was systems engineering. there was a professor of Molecular Engineering, chemical engineering, and myself and Neil, chemical, the person who did the chemistry and is all like, go do like I did the math part. And Neil did the systems part, the funny part with it, we sat in on each other’s lectures, it shows when we were lecturing. And when we lecture normal students we’re doing other things are paying attention. But with Neil, I don’t think they breathe for 45 minutes or time, to just. But the interesting thing, he was he was very good professor. I, we had a meeting one time they had a contract with Wright Patt. They’re doing some kind of engineering and medicine study. Think of an oxygen system or something in an aircraft. And in any case, in my office for this meeting, I had George Rieveschl who was a graduate of UC and invented the first antihistamine Benadryl. George’s done a lot for the uni—Henry Heim—Heimlich. Remember Heimlich maneuver. The Heimlich maneuver when you’re choking on something you get under the principal. He was the same as—and then Neil Armstrong. I had three other famous people in my office at the same time [Laughs]. Here at UC, yeah. And that was kind of an interesting meeting for the number of highlights that I had here. And the other thing that has changed when I started in the research office and 73, or 72, or 73, uh, research was done, but it wasn’t a higher priority. And now it’s really grown. Yeah. And we know, one of the first intellectual property officer I hired back in about 82, or 83, if I remember, right, and now that office has grown, and is a lot of trade off between the idea of coming out from professors here at universities, the industry for getting the information, developed after university basic research over in the industry a lot quicker now, which is so important. Technology transfer, if you will. So that’s one of the things that I, I really enjoyed doing. And the individual I hired him, I said he was working half time for us, and now I guess you to have a staff of about 10 people in that office. It’s amazing how it is grown, grown. And the people here it was very interesting working with the various professors in the research office, I got to work with almost the entire University Medical Center, still pretty independent. But I did toward my last three years, I did work for the medical center a little more. But all the research was done funneled—I mean, funding of it had to be funneled through our office. So I got to interact with a lot of very good people, intelligent people, and I learned a lot. I’ve told my wife, I learned something every day. Seemed like I come home and learn something new. A wonderful feeling.

NO: In the school? So are you still involved with like, what is going on now? And is there like any changes, you’ve noticed?

FT: Oh, my changes were tremendous. Physical and the way they teach. I mean, I remember when I came in as an undergraduate student, we had a dean—think, I think Mick Jergger is a German man. Very, very good man. But we were not here at—the Wilson auditorium was on the corner of right across from where DAAP is now where they got the temporary building more or less. And we had a convocation there. And it is very dramatic way. He said ‘look to you’re right!’ Naturally all eighteen year-olds looking to the right. ‘Look to your left!’ Look to your left. And he said, ‘only one of you will be here five years from now.’ In other words, the other and—that was true back then. about one third of the people entering engineering graduated high washout rate. It just wasn’t right. And now that has changed so much. I mean, good students, I mean, NJ had good students coming back then. But for some reason, they felt they had to flunk a number of people. And that is really changed. Now, the graduation rate is 60-70%, which is very good. And that’s one big change, I think the instruction they get much more help to students. If a student was struggling, you were on your own. Now, there are ways student-oriented or faculty-oriented that they can help students. And that’s so, so wonderful for, especially first year students where they have no background, their parents can help them if they have no background. So that’s a big change that I see. And I think, well, the technology is changing. I had a slide rule. And that’s the way we did problems. And then when my daughter was here, they had a calculator, and now everythings done on the comupter. I mean, the phone that I’ve got my pocket you probably had pocket is probably as good is that—when I was up at Wright field I was telling you about that probably is more powerful than a 1620 IBM machine, I was talking about the whole room. So technology is really,

NO: I work in microcenter too. And like, every time I come by, like the prices of like, flash drives go how like gone so low, and like people used to come in into like the we have, like 16 gig. flash drive for, like I said was $2 and like people come in and like ‘know, back in the days this thing’s for like, it’s so big, and it cost a lot.’ So I was like, Yes, I can.

FT: It’s really changed. I mean, it’s funny story. My daughter, as I said, was in chemical engineering. And when she graduated, I remember 84, but they had calculators and TI calculators and your HP calculators. But anyway, for the battery went dead. And I had given her my old slide rule and taught her how to use it. So she pulled out the slide rule and all the other kids were looking at her. What do you What are you doing here? And her professor came down and said, ‘I know where you got that slide rule from from your father.’ Cause I knew him. [Both laugh]

NO: Oh, okay. Okay. And she goes to UC, right?

FT: She graduated from here.

NO: Oh, okay okay.

FT: She worked at Procter and Gamble which she thinks—I’m so old. She’s retired already. [unintelligible]

NO: Okay, so, um, like talk to us about administration like some of the people like this meeting. Is there like, some you particularly liked, other you didn’t like?

FT: Different—like I said when I came here Walter Langsam was president.

NO: Like the one that that this building [Langsam library] is named after, right?

FT: Yeah, exactly right. He’s a historian, very good historian. He’s very formal. I mean, very good man, but very formal. And then after him they hired Warren Bennis, and that was he was just the opposite Warren was just—he—well. Show you the difference, Langsam had a driver in a limousine. It took him to work and everything. Warren came in government a limousine and bought a jeep. He used to come to campus and an open air Jeep all the time, you know, he was just very, very informal. So the difference in the styles, the different presidents that we had, and then Henry Winkler came in, I remember Henry Winkler was after Bennis. Yeah. And Henry was a very good president. He was a historian too. And then after Winkler, I guess, with Joe Steger. And that’s the Steger Center over by the Yeah, football stadium now. And that was they were all different types of people with interesting working with them. Their different styles. So I enjoyed that.

NO: The like, the styles, like one being like formal, one being informal, like did it affect like relationships with the students? Like, did it have like, any significance?

FT: Yeah. I think, I think that Walter Langsam, he, he really didn’t interact with students too much.

NO: Okay.

FT: Whereas Warren Bennis did. And I think Henry Winkler did also in a different way, not as informally. But I think, President, two presidents ago, the one that went to Vancouver, forgot his name. He was, he was the best. So I mean, I was retired by then. But he knew, I think he knew the student’s name, every student’s name. He was fantastic. I can’t think of his name. He left here, about six or seven years ago, I guess. But anyway, yeah, the way they interact with the students, I think it’s very important. It’s different. It is different styles, and how the students react to that. There’s a lot of—when Warren Bennis was here, that’s when we became from a city university to a state univeristy. So there’s a big change there. And as I said, the other change was that razor used to be that the budget of the university was funded, maybe 95% by the state. Now, if it’s 25%, it’s a lot. I mean, we’re—someone at Ohio State told me one time, ‘we’re not state supported Universities anymore, we’re state assisted Universities,’ they give us a little money. So that’s just tremendously the outside funding that the university gets is so much, I remember when we got our first million dollar contract—research contract here, we thought it was great. Now, they get $20 $30 million contracts, not, not unusual at all, especially in the medical center, from the NIH contract. And other things, the regulations changed. We had to institute a human subjects policy that for like an interview like this, before you were allowed to do that you—we had to had to go through a committee to make sure you weren’t in in any way, endangering the student, or taking away his or her rights or anything like that. And the human subjects committee now have—any federally supported research project, they have to go through the human—that uses subjects in any way at all, physically or psychologically, they have to go through that committee for—the regulations have changed a lot. It’s made it more difficult for the university, and more expensive because they have to do these things, so the federal government would cut off the funding that they give for researcher. Difficult. And the growth of the medical center to the Medical Center. It’s grown tremendously in the last forty years or something like that. And I think the the diversity of the students, here is another thing.

NO: Yeah.

FT: Back then there weren’t a lot of students from overseas. And now if you look at the population in university, very, very significant. And that’s great, because you get a diversity of ideas. But that’s one of the things that bothers me nowadays about University the political correctness. To me a university is a place where you—everybody expresses their ideas. We listen. Your idea may be different than mine, but I’ll listen to your idea. And I hope you listen to my idea and then maybe we could reach some—

NO: Understanding.

FT: compromise and say okay, I agree with you on this. I disagree with that. Nowadays, it seems like if you’re, you’re you’re extremely liberal or extremely conservative, and they don’t listen to each other. And they they don’t—the liberals don’t want the conservatives talking to conservatives don’t want the liberals talking. How do you how you learn anything? How do you progress? If you don’t have that, and that really bothers me. And that’s one of the downsides, I think that we have now is just that people, they talk a lot, but they don’t listen to each other. And that that is something that somehow universities have to provide the leading—leadership and that I don’t know about. I don’t I don’t follow it that closely. But most universities are not doing a good job, I don’t think because they’re, they’re saying the conservatives, forbid, the liberals to speech and liberal, prohibit conservative this—how do you learn? How do you find out about different people? How do you find out about the world, what the world is really like. We all live in our own little shells, and we don’t learn anything that, that bothers me. And I think was better back when—before I retired, we were willing to trade ideas. And I may not agree with everything you said, but I was willing to listen to you and vice versa. And I think that makes learning a lot better than it is now. Well, that’s one of the disappointments I have with universities in general and not just UC. I don’t think UC is any better or worse than most of them, about the same. how do you change it? I don’t know, wish I knew. But the growth of the university. I mean, when I was in administration, my last year, the provost, and we’re all the administrators. Our goal was to keep the university below 36,000 students, we thought that was the most it could handle with the facilities and the faculty and they had at that time, and now just what is about 45,000 now? Something like that? And it’s doing very well, which is, which is good. It’s growing, growing tremendously. It just got better, more diversified student population more diversified in the faculty population. Yeah. Which I think it’s a good thing.

NO: So you will hear like when like, I can say you experienced like the change in like diversity. Yeah, was there any sort of like, turmoil, like was there like any like, how was it? Was it just they just—?

FT: From the faculty point of view I don’t think there was no. I mean, there was change, but I think it was the level of the quality of the faculty they were hired, does not diminished or anything like that, but a matter of fact it could be an improvement a little bit. So that was good. And the number of students. I think the way students were treated here was changed for the better. I mean, like when I went to work in Dallas, my first co-op job was in Dallas, Texas, and that was 1957, I guess. And afraid to say, I hate to say that back as a federal aid aircraft plant, federally owned aircraft plant, and they still have colored restrooms and white restrooms, colored drinking fountains. I couldn’t believe it when I got down there. That’s the way life was there. Nothing that is a country we should be proud of. But thank goodness, that’s all changed now [NO laughs]. For all, although there’s still a lot of racist racism in the world, which is too bad. But that’s a different subject.

NO: I know [Laughs].

FT: I don’t want to get into that.

NO: And so—okay with like, any specific incidents or like events that happened, like you can remember that was really maybe like about two or three, like, different? I have one that we studied in class. That was that, was like, pretty much it, it looked like something that was really big during that time, that was like the the breakdown of the Sander Building? And like the implosion of this thing. I know. I was one like, main thing was the video that was still stashed away—like were you there and like what?

FT: I was on top of one or the other buildings.

NO: Okay,

FT: Matter of fact, I took a picture of it and put it in one of the server engineering magazines. But that was very interesting to watch. That is very interesting from point of view, you have big building there. And it was more—the reason it was imploded, was it was more costly to renovate the building than to blow it up and build a new building and that’s why the university went away. it had asbestos in it, it was so expensive that takes out and keep the people healthy while they were working. So that was a that was an interesting thing to watch. I was on to the Tower. I forget the—the dormitory on top. On Calhoun Street. I was on top of that with some other people watching. implosion. So that was very interesting. And one of other things.

NO: I’m still I just want to go a little bit still on the implosion, like from an engineering point of view. Like, was there anything, because I think like it, it takes a lot of like, I don’t know, like calculations to be able to know how to place everything.

FT: I was involved at all, but they did a good job. Because they do that a lot now over the world. That was interesting, I guess. Then you get to sports. When that was in, well, when I was an undergraduate student 60 and 61. They NC—the basketball team won the national championship. That was when they had Oscar Robertson playing well, Oscar was here in 58 and 59. He came in the same year as an undergraduate that I came in, we both started, I didn’t know him, he got a lot more publicity. He, he came in the same time in 1956. If I began as a undergraduate student, in a basketball team were very good, they won a national championship for several years after he graduated. So historically, I think that was significant. I think that gave the university prior to that just being a smaller—I really don’t remember what the enrollment was when I started, but it was probably nine or 10,000 at the most. And to win the National Basketball Championship, I think brought some recognition to the university, even though it has nothing to do with academics. The way the world is, it gets written up in a paper a lot. So people read, ‘oh University of Cincinnati, I remember that. That’s the team that won the, yeah. Okay.’ And then when Neil Armstrong came here, came here in 1972. I remember right? Because at that time, Ron Houston, was the director of the Institute of space sciences, and I was the assistant or associate director, and President Langsam asked us to go to Washington to meet with Dr.—Mr. Armstrong to kind of acquaint them with the university and answer any questions he might have before he came. So I was able to do that, and it was kind of a historic event in my life anyway, to meet the guy who just been on the moon. Who later like I said, came to the university.

NO: Yeah.

FT: I guess those were the most historically type things that I was involved in. And I think that I think more recently, after I retired the part of this project, the emeriti, start getting more involved in university. Because that’s a lot of the professor’s retire has such a wealth of knowledge in their, his or her particular field, and just let it sit there and not use it. If it’s not very smart. Listen. So now using that more and getting more in maritime involved with that, is, I think a very good thing to do University is doing. So that’s probably how this project Yeah, I can’t remember, I would have found the board your emerite board for a couple years. And when Gene Lewis, who was a former provost and Professor of History came up with this idea. And I think everybody’s in here, that really is a good idea. And now, it’s really helping. I think the university.

NO: You said Gene, right?

FT: What?

NO: You said Gene?

FT: Gene.

NO: Oh, yeah, I think we met him.

FT: Yeah. You know, he was farmer history. Matter of fact, I had him for history as an undergraduate student, been teaching for a long time. He was very good professor. At he, for a matter of fact, I heading for American history. And the book, we used the book written by Walter Langsam, so it’s—[Both laugh]

NO: okay. All right. So let’s talk about things like—like things like, how does the university responds to your needs? Do this to do that, like personal stuff? In case, I don’t know. I don’t want I won’t talk figures. Like, how did the university respond to the needs of faculty and u especially? Like,

FT: Well, there’s always some tension, especially since the union the AAUP.

NO: Okay.

FT: Because that started—it was under, Warren Bennis, if I remember, right, it had to be in the 70s. Sometimes time. There’s always some tensions there. But in general, I think that—in our office, Vice President for researching University Dean—we work with the faculty pretty closely so we didn’t have much of a tension. I think an Al was a professor chemistry, Professor of engineering. So we work pretty well. Sometimes the finance people and the people like that ready to respond. it pretty well. And I think there’s a good working relationship now between the faculty and the administration. There’s always going to be some tension that’s natural in any organization, you have tension in between the administrators and the people who actually do the work. The faculty do, they do the teaching, and without the faculty, we wouldn’t to have a university without humans, we wouldn’t have a university. That’s what you know, people say about students and say, .hey, that’s why the University is here to educate the students. The faculty are the ones doing the education.’ But in general, I think they responded fairly well.

NO: Okay. And—what, we have this question, so, what are you most proud of? Like, what are you most proud of as being a teacher here? And then everything you’ve experienced? Like, what are you most proud of ?Where you can say, you are proud about Or what, like disappointed you worse, in a way? Like is that like any major disappointments you had at all? Any things that you’re proud of like?

FT: I think, probably, if I had mentioned earlier, the growth in research effort, and involvement of the students in the research effort, I mean, now there’s a lot of research projects, not only employed graduate students, but also undergraduate students. And that’s a wonderful learning experience. I mean, it’s one thing to, to listen to what’s in a book and write formulas on the board or what have you. But to actually get involved with something with a research project and find out, ‘gee, I’ll try this doesn’t always work the way you think it’s going to work.’ The book may say, it’s gonna work that way. But for whatever reason, it doesn’t work that way. So you learn, you’ve learned so much by doing I think that’s a very, very important aspect of the growth in the learning process. And as I said, early on, the co-op program is part of that too. Because going out in industry, and working, you can see, hey, film ideas, you’re learning university sound great, but in industry, they may not work as well. And that I think, is so important. And that that is something I think I’m proud of. And the other thing, as I’ve mentioned earlier, too, is the intellectual property, the growth in that area were transmitting the technology transfer from the basic research ideas generated in university to industry. And if I said we hired—when I was in the office, the first technology transfer manufa, lawyer, chemical engineer by training, matter of fact, he got a training, UC, you want to Ohio State and got his master’s degree in a legal degree there. But we hired him from industry. He was in it, that guy knew what he had retired from a conglomerate out of Geneva, Switzerland. And we he came back to the States, he was looking for part time work. And someone, let me know about it. So I contacted him, we were able to hire him. And he started the program that is now I think, a very significant effort the University is using or is having that which I think you kind of proud of. We started it back in 1984. Whenever we hired one person to work halftime, and now there’s just at least 10 people taking care of it. Disappointments. Now, I don’t think I had any major disappointments. Other than if I mentioned earlier, the political correctness but that was, that didn’t happen too, after I left the university in 1994. Gotten bad.

NO: Okay.

FT: But teaching if I said, the reason I really enjoy teaching—well I did a lot of teaching was the interaction with the students because—I used to tell my wife and I said earlier, ‘you learn something every day from the students. They’ll come up with an idea. I hadn’t thought of that, you know, that keeps you fresh keeps you young. I’m 81 years old. I’m still climbing stairs with you. It does help keep you young, which is good.

NO: Okay.

FT: It’s a good, it’s a good profession. It has a chance go into it.

NO: Okay, sir. You mentioned early on, like—I want to ask, like what has like the priorities of the universities? Do you think it has changed the way, but you mentioned earlier on about things like—okay, has the priorities of the universities changed in a sense for you?

FT: I think, I think definitely. I said more research oriented, which I think some people would say, ‘well, research is taking a higher priority than teaching’ and I don’t believe that. I think the two, they work together. Research by the faculty of the University can really benefit the students in a number of ways. What we talked about was the fact that students can participate in that research, but the other way is keeping the faculty up to date to because they’re on the cutting edge of what’s happening. in their field, so they’re going to become better teachers. So I think that’s extremely important. Again, I think that’s one of the [unintelligible] priorities, which is I think it’s good. And I think the other one is probably giving more assistance to students because they get into a university, you’ve got to have pretty much talent anyway. All right. And before when I started, there wasn’t much help given to students who were, you know, throwing into a pool, sink or swim if you would. And nowadays, there’s more help. And that’s so important, I think, to get some, some people develop more slowly than other people, and they, they haven’t developed work habits and study habits, and people can help them along. And that’s so important to do universities do wake up nowadays. That’s very good.

NO: And I goes to say like, the land space of the university has increased over time. How did it look like you’re in like, like, like, basically, you know, when it was like a municipal like University, like, I knew there were like, buildings around like neighborhoods around like how?

FT: It’s changed tremendously. Where a lot of the buildings are was sort of Burnett Woods at one time. The Medical Center has grown. Student Union has grown tremendously CC—College Conservatory of Music—CCM has grown from it. We’ve expanded the campus. And those buildings got good. I mean, some of the buildings now are quite architecturally very at well known the medical center and from the building. So I think that the university has grown tremendously physically. And I mean, you look at the budget of the university I, I don’t know what it is. I’m sure it’s over a billion dollars a year and it’s physically and monetarily it has grown tremendously. I mean, our endowment last time I look with over a billion dollars. I mean, I pay off in comparison to Harvard it’s only 34 billion or something like that. Nevertheless, it’s it’s significant. So from that point of view, yeah, it’s the neighborhoods around the University are gone now. There were little pockets and neighborhoods down where a lot of the B athletic facilities are under you know, the tennis courts and the soccer field and the new basketball arena that was a little neighborhoods there people were living there. And intramural games that the students participate in that where we had earned murals football and baseball and things like that, there were fields down in there. So it’s it’s changed and like I said, Burnett Woods, there was a drive through Burnett Woods that came up and I guess the edge of the Chemistry building that was the entry to campus. Right there were University drive come in. Well, there’s not even a street there anymore. So physically, it’s changed significantly.

NO: And like now amongst it is one of the problem is like parking. Has it ever been? Was it ever a problem? Or like—

FT: It was always. Parking at university—when I was at Michigan it was the same way. Parking horrendous at any university you go to. We are not unique there. Take my word for what you had no garages factory parked on the street. It was all neighborhoods. Neighbors didn’t like having all the students park in the neighborhood. But that happened. So the yeah—that parking. That’s one thing about being in America when I retired. I have lifetime free parking.[Both laugh] Best retirement benefit that I got. But parkings always been a problem. And it still is, if any university I have a grant from that you go to University of California, Berkeley. And that’s a mess out there. I have a granddaughter that went to Northwestern. Parking’s terrible there. It’s it’s uniform.

NO: Okay, so since the—since it became like a state University, how has UC been interacting with the University—with a community? Has it done a good job of like, being able to be the university for the city? Like has,

FT: I think in a way Yes. I think there is a lot of programs at the university and have been for years and years and still are that interact with the community. Whether it be urban analysis, or urban design, or political science, or what have you. I liked the way the university is helping out with education now high school and elementary for STEM—science, technology, engineering, and mathematics—of participating with the old, use high school there are a number of other units and I like the way the university is outreaching. Now to with elderly people, CCM does a lot in retirement centers. Now they go out to like Maple Knoll is one, and they have programs out there not only educational programs, but CCM students come out perform out there. So that I think is very good. And I think that’s, that’s good and university should continue to do that. Because we’re called to University of Cincinnati and make sure to interact with the community. And there’s always more to be done. Now. Sometimes in university we’re building a building, displacing some people living there that didn’t work out too well. With that. That’s part of development anything. Who is it, the FC Cincinnati’s going through that now with soccer stadium is one of those things. People get displaced, they get upset, and I don’t blame them. But development has to take place in a place anyway. And how do you do it without hurting from people. Who was it? Abraham Lincoln said, ‘you can please all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, and you can’t please all the people all the time.’ And that’s a truism. That is a truism. So that’s been a big change.

NO: Okay, I want to talk about things like— how did you see all that what you hope for the university? Like, in your mind, like, what do you want to see the university do? More like the future, the university, like, how it has increased with lesi research has become better, as she said. What do you want to see in that line of research, like what it can be better? And also, like, generally, in the university, what you want to see easily become? Or like—

FT: One of the most important thing if I want we talked about a little bit earlier. Political correctness.

NO: Yeah, okay.

FT: make the university what is supposed to be okay. That is an interchange of ideas, where people listen to everybody to each other. And they gain knowledge from that. Because I always tell people, you never learn anything by talking. You learn by listening. And people don’t listen very well. So that’s extremely important. And I think we should never forget the purpose of the universities, educate students. Research is important. But the students have to be number one. So that means the research has to be tied to the education of the students. And that’s extremely important. And some people forget that, both faculty and students. So I think, I would like to make sure that that’s always a priority of the university. Research is important, but the students are, why we’re here. And the research has to be tied to our students. And the other thing is, to get the research done here with faculty and students, our facility can benefit society. And that’s where technology transfer comes in, which I was talking about earlier. And I think the university is doing that much better. They have these innovation centers now. The old, the old, Sears Center, and things like that. It’s extremely important. You know, I was into science and engineering primarily, but I think what the university does is arts—CCM, is extremely power—good college. They’ve turned out some excellent artists, uh producers of music directors, things of this nature. And DAAP, their, their program that they have over there and designs one of the best in the country. I mean, urban design and interior design, and your architectural school with a very good—medical school is excellent. And they serve the community and that’s growing and continues to grow. Not only the research, but your patient care. It’s—so I—that’s what I would like to see University do get more active with students and research, continue that I should say. Get more active, continue their activity with the community, which includes the Medical Center, CCM, the performing arts, the visual arts through DAAP, and, and humanities too. I mean, you need to be a fully educated person, you have to know something, right? And that’s one of the things that bothers me, not about to get a rescue, but by the world. We tend to forget about history. And not everything that any country in the world has done is good. But you can’t wipe out what the history is. History is there. You’ve got to learn from the history and do better. And sometimes we don’t want to do that. We, we ignore history. And—or we try to put it down and say, ‘Well, you know, that’s not part of us.’ Well, it is. It is part of us. And you’ve got to learn from that as part of being educated. So, hopefully, that answered your question.

NO: Yes, you answered my question. No, so Okay. So instead—anything like you want to say like, anything that maybe, like want to say to help to us and to help like, people who want to know about a university later on in the future? Like, is anything personally you want to say or?

FT: No, just keeping an open mind open mind. Don’t think you know everything because you don’t know everything is matter. I always tell people that, you know, if I can use the last week, but the more you’re educated, the more you learn, the more you realize you don’t know. You’re 18, I don’t know how old you are. When you’re 18 years old, you think you know everything, you know? [NO laughs] There’s nothing you don’t know. All right. He said, Oh, then you find out, ‘I didn’t know that.’ And I’m 81 now and I’m finding out I still don’t know too much. I’m learning every day. So the thing that you have to impress upon the faculty needs to impress upon students is that you never stopped learning. Once you stop learning. That’s terrible. You’ve got it. No matter what you do in life, you’re learning whether you’re learning more interpersonal communications, whether you’re learning things about technology, what are you learning about history, learning about music, arts, what have you, never stopped learning. And the faculty should impress that and I think they do to the students nowadays. So that to me that that’s important. And if as a parting side, I’ve really, I’ve been fortunate, I’ve really enjoyed my career, the University is a student, I got a good education here, I worked. When I Co Op, I work with students from Georgia Tech from MIT, University of Texas. Well, off Northwestern, I forget, they had co-op students up to chance Vought aircraft, or our work, and our students that hold with anyone—back then, and they still can, I mean, our students that graduate from here, you may not hear as much about Cincinnati as Harvard, or Yale or Cal-Berkeley or have a grandson going there. I tried to get into UC, but he wanted to Cal-Berkeley. But anyway, if you apply yourself, you can get a wonderful education here, to have a very productive and happy life. And I was very fortunate to work here for so many years, I worked with some wonderful people, all the way from the janitors are all the way up to the president of the university, and one of my best friend’s work in Cisco plan here, and I still see him as a matter of fact, which is wonderful. It’s been a wonderful career for me, my family I’ve had four children graduated from here, only one in engineering. Three went for business They got a good education. And Matter of fact, I have two—one granddaughter, they just graduated and a granddaughter and a grandson. They’re here right now. And they’re in business. I don’t know why the whole family is in business, but they do [NO laughs]. So it’s been fun. I’ve enjoyed it.

NO: And I’ve also enjoyed the interview video. It’s been so enlightening. Yeah. And I want to know, like, if there’s any person like anyone, like you would recommend for an interview and why would you want it like, Is there anyone that I suppose that knowledge from someone who would know that you think might be interested in?

FT: Al Yates, would be if you could get him back here. He’s not here. He lives in Boulder, Colorado now, he be interested if he started a lot of things here that really were good. I think other person would be would Norm Baker, I think he’s on your list already. Norm Baker, Norman Baker. He was a provost, professor in quantitative analysis in business school. And he was Provost here, too, for a number of years. And he said he’d be a very good person interview. Oh, who else. Well, there’s so many people on the list. When we first put it together the Council of the Emeriti board, and I forgot who else. Gene Lewis. do an interview with Gene. I would be very good. He knows a lot about the University. I’m afraid to say some of the other people are no longer with us. They’re somewhere. They passed away [Laughs]. You must realize I made you want a lot of my colleagues are no longer in the world! Sad to say I said I would recommend so I think that people Gene might recommend would be would be great.

NO: The other person I’m working with is David Lee Smith, and you happen to know him.

FT: David was on the council with me he was over in DAAP if I remember right, okay. He was in design architecture anyway. Yeah, David’s a good person too. He was on the board. Who else is there? people in different fields. That’s one thing when you get old, you forget things too easily. They come back to you, but it takes a while but the neurons are firing is well, you know, they’re things were hidden in your makeup like a computer in different file folders. And you can’t access it as quickly as you used. It comes to you in the middle of night or wake up my wife and say ‘I remember!’ Other than that, so I’m sure you get a lot of interviews with a lot of people. The good project. So I hope I hope eventually something comes out. Hopefully, I’ll be able to see some

NO: Yeah, we have planned

FT: To put it together? Yeah, we’ve been put together and like you. We I think we send you the footage so that you’re able to see. I mean, I think it looks like other people’s photos are just yours. Okay, I guess yeah. So you’re trying to put that all together and like [unintelligible] I’ll learn from it. I don’t know. People might say, Oh, yeah, I remember that. I remember what I was talking to you. Oh, yeah. It’s it’s a nice project.

NO: Thank you.

FT: How long is it? When do you hope to complete it all?

NO: We’re supposed to interview like three people.

FT: How many?

NO: Three.

FT: Three? How many people are doing it?

NO: Five

FT: Five. So fifteen people.

NO: Yes, fifteen people. Yeah, we’re supposed to do all that and finish all that by August. Yeah, by August. Yeah. We have like three weeks to be able to do it. So next week. I’m doing someone else. The other week. I’m doing someone else. So you’re trying to get ideas on like what people to have like, information startup. So that’s basically it.

FT: I wish you well. I enjoyed talking to you.

NO: Thank you.

FT: You were quite quiet. [Laughs, unintelligible]

NO: Yeah, that’s basically it. I want to thank you for coming.

FT: Thank you, I appreciate it. Thanks to you young man. Good luck in your—what are you studying? By the way?

NO: I’m in urban planning.

FT: You’re in what?

NO: Urban planning.

FT: Urban planning? Tom Wagner was over there. just that’s another name, you might talk to Tom Wagner. He was professor of urban planning if I remember right. And he’s retired now of course. And he was also in a provost office. He was dean of men for when we had a dean of men. I don’t think they have that title anymore. He was dean of men for a while and then he was an Associate Provost or something. So Tom would be and another thought another. Maria Krupple. She was in Ohio College of Applied Science. She was an English, but she was in a provost office. She was interesting, because when Norm Baker was Provost, she was in charge of the interaction with the faculty. We call it Faculty Affairs. We all here in charge of Faculty Affairs, all right. But anyway, she I don’t know what she could describe to you. But she had a lot of interesting cases that she had to work on that involved—

NO: Is it, does it have to do with law? is it

FT: Not all appropriate [Laughs]. But you know, not routinely, but she got involved with all that I was not involved much of that. There might she might not be a good person ever, because she wouldn’t be able to tell you a lot of this stuff. But Tom Wagner wouldn’t be Tom white would be excellent. And he has a lot. I think he was an undergraduate student here too. He got he got his doctorate for education. I remember right. So Tom would be good. So I wish you well, thank

NO: Thank you so much.

FT: Thank you for setting it up. And giving me my morning exercise by running up the steps with you. He asked me if I wanted to take the elevator, I wasn’t going to do that. I wasn’t going to give into him on that. [NO laughs] Now I gotta go home, take a nap for it.