Mom: The Ultimate Chief Operating Officer

By Linda Manske Ebert ’88

I’ve moved into my 40s with an uninvited tire around my waist, gray hairs that aren’t supposed to be in my portfolio for another 10 years, and four kids confident they know more than me.

Somewhere in the midst of this is a fond memory of my time at Miami. A middle-aged wife and mother, I can’t believe how much life has changed since I lived in Oxford.

For instance, instead of going to the gym to check out the guys like I did on campus, I now go to try to defy the laws of nature. I never knew a body could take on such a shape.

Back in Ogden Hall’s dining room, I could down four doughnuts for breakfast and never see a negative effect. Now, if I even look at a doughnut, pounds appear as if saying, “I know what you are thinking. Don’t go there!”

While you won’t find me listed in Miamian for a company promotion or a new book, I am thankful for my education and have made full use of my Miami degree.

My major in organizational management and MIS might not have impacted a Fortune 500 company, but it certainly has helped me run a household of one husband, four kids, two cats, and a dog.

Those PERT diagrams we studied in production class are constantly floating through my head as I get kids to basketball, soccer, and Boy Scout camp without forgetting the myriad of forms and mandated items. Or the requisite kid.

Not too long ago I started implementing risk management principles as well. My oldest son is learning to drive. Need I say more? Actually, he makes wise calculated risks and has better reflexes than I ever did. Still, his siblings went too far when they took a poll and said they feel safer riding with him than me. Hmmph.

That leads me to my human resource skills acquired during my Miami studies. Between trying to navigate the swimsuit wars with a teenage daughter and helping to develop a tween son’s organizational skills, opportunities for effective negotiations abound.

I admit I’m not always the calm HR manager with a reasoned resolution to every complaint. “Because I said so” is the best I can come up with some days. Maybe it’s time to go beyond my Psych 101 course.

Then there are the expectations. Thank goodness for my sociology courses and Dr. Reo Christenson, who expanded my understanding of the way people live and how their backgrounds affect their choices.

Reading Ken Auletta’s The Underclass and his analysis of poverty’s underlying factors challenged my thinking and opened my eyes to different perspectives. As a result, I am less frustrated and more understanding of others.

The Ebert “company,” minus the two cats and one dog: (front) Mike, Jessica, and Linda; (back) Brandon, Justin, and Brianna.

That includes my family. As much as I might want my children to model their mother at times, I understand their perspectives and experiences are different. I thrill as they develop their gifts and their personalities with their unique views of life, and I find it exciting as they figure out their purpose.

I can’t change who they were created to be. And, most days, I don’t want to. But as with all good managers, I hope to help by providing an environment where they can be held accountable while their abilities flourish and their passions mature.

As I sweat through my workouts trying to rid myself of those uninvited pounds, I am content with the many changes I’ve experienced during my 20 years since graduation.

Maybe one day I’ll manage a “real” company. Until then, just call me the chief operating officer of the Ebert Household.

Linda Manske Ebert ’88 is slowly getting her toes wet in the work force, starting Ebert Communications, www.ebertcommunications.com — a company she operates from her home in Cumming, Ga.

During our Bicentennial year, “One more thing” is changing emphasis and asking you to share your Miami memories. Submit essays for consideration to: Donna Boen, Miamian editor, “One more thing,” 208 Glos Center, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio 45056 or e-mail to Miamian@MiamiOH.edu. Please limit yourself to 700 words and include your name, class year, address, and home phone number.

Additional Miami memories

What a small world

By Dale Claypoole ’65 MS ’72

Here’s a small-world story that you likely get a lot of. My wife, Jeannie, and I spent a couple of weeks driving through the Carolinas and Georgia in October.

We were staying in Charleston, and I took the boat out to historic Fort Sumter while Jeannie visited yet another lovely mansion. On the boat, I vaguely heard two guys a few seats away talking about their Navy days. One asked the other where he was from, and he said he was raised on a dairy farm in southern Ohio.

“Where in southern Ohio?” “Oh, a place you likely never heard of,” responded the other. “Oxford, Ohio.” “No kidding,” said the first. “I went to Miami University.” The dairy farmer commented that he did as well.

Of course, I had to wander down and comment on the irony of having three of us on the same boat. As it turned out, the first guy and I were in the same class although we didn’t know one another.

I returned to the inn we were staying at in downtown Charleston and was telling Jeannie the story when the woman at the next table broke in to tell me she had graduated from Miami in the ’70s.

Dale Claypoole ’65 MS ’72 of Sacramento, Calif., is one of Professor Ken McDiffett’s Gear Packers, having served as an assistant head resident in Symmes Hall while earning his master’s at Miami. The Gear Packers will hold their next reunion at Lake Tahoe this July.

Career builders

By Tom Thrailkill ’52

A recent Miamian had an article about favorite professors that triggered my Miami recollections. I actually had two favorites who had an immediate and long-lasting effect on my Miami years (’48–’52) as well as my career in physical education.

During my freshman week, the university doctors were doing their job, and doing it well. I had a serious leg and hip problem, brought on by osteomyelitis at age 5, that was easily visible by the naked eye. The doctors agreed that I was not fit for normal physical activity, much less the rigors of being a physical education major. I was advised that I could enroll in the university and participate in “restrictive gym” but in no way be a major in physical education. This decision appeared to destroy a dream I had had since seventh grade. I called home, of course, to enlist the aid of my parents and anyone else they could recruit to speak for me.

During this process, my father discovered that Professor Tommy Van Voorhis of the physical education department had been a schoolmate in high school. Immediately a phone call was made. Professor Van Voorhis listened and agreed to help — thus I had a friend at the university.

In less than a week and after several conference calls with my orthopedic surgeon, various coaches and physical education instructors, and Professor Van Voorhis, I was admitted to the physical education department on a trial basis, still confined to “restrictive gym” — and was teaching this program at the end of six weeks.

Full status as a physical education major assured me that my dream would become a reality — thanks to Professor Tommy Van Voorhis.

My second favorite is Raymond Ray who came to Miami my senior year to head up the newly formed aquatic program and natatorium under construction [Billings Hall]. Mr. Ray had been the swimming coach at Fenn College in Cleveland, producing at least one Olympian. He was also the aquatic director at the Downtown YMCA in Cleveland.

On the Friday before commencement, Mr. Ray called me and asked me to come over to Withrow Court, the physical education headquarters. At this meeting I was asked if I had ever considered the YMCA as a career. Not only was the YMCA not in my plans, but I knew nothing of the Y’s requirements and possibilities. Mr. Ray counseled with me and gave me some good food for thought. Within six weeks, I had accepted an interview and signed on as physical director of the Covington, Ky., YMCA.

After earning the title “director of physical education,” I served in this capacity in four associations from Georgia to New Jersey and started a new YMCA in Lafayette, La. I also have been involved for 54 years, 25 as director, of the YMCA Blue Ridge Leaders School — a leadership training school in physical education for teenagers — the largest in the world. In addition, I served eight years as national and international consultant for youth physical education and leadership development. My work has had me involved with teenagers and their advisers from 27 states and 23 countries.

Thank you, Tommy Van Voorhis, Raymond Ray, and Miami University.

Tom Thrailkill ’52 continues to enjoy living on “his” mountain in Swannanoa, N.C., where winter was light again this year. He is busy preparing for his 55th year on the Blue Ridge Leaders School staff in June.

Miami Merger still possible long after graduation

By Victoria Sheridan Hart ’83

Getting the mail each day isn’t the exciting ritual I remember as a child. As a youngster, there was always the anticipation of a letter from Grandma or a cousin. Perhaps there was a note from a summer camp friend or a pen pal arranged through a school project. Now, it’s mostly bills and junk mail. Communication from friends comes in the form of e-mail or phone calls.

But every February our mail carrier puts a smile on my face and a twinkle in my eye when she delivers our Miami Merger Valentine card.

I have always been a goal-oriented individual. I credit my Miami education with helping me set my goals high and showing me how to build my skills in the classroom and beyond. Becoming a Miami Merger was never my goal. I heard about those girls who went to college for their “MRS” degree. That was not me.

In fact, I didn’t meet many of them at Miami. I listened to the romantic stories told on campus by tour guides and representatives from the Alumni Relations office about the number of Miami Mergers — when two Miami grads fall in love and marry. I could envision the notion, but I was not the lead actress.

For me, dating at Miami was a way to meet new and interesting people from different places. Sometimes, it was an opportunity to be invited to a fun fraternity party or someone else’s dorm formal. Occasionally, it was because I just needed a date for my own formal, or some “really nice guy” was hunting for a date to his formal, and someone thought of me. Love and marriage were never the objectives.

Fast forward six years after graduation. My career was going well, I had great friends, and I’d kissed a few frogs that never seemed to turn into princes. The grass always appeared greener, and at this point I was longing for the pastures of Oxford, Ohio, and all those amazing young men that I didn’t appreciate when I was there. Perhaps I should have paid more attention to this Miami Merger story.

Just when I was ready to give up and accept my calling as a single person, a co-worker, who is also a Miami grad, invited me to a new restaurant owned by a friend of a friend. My co-worker was recruiting bodies to help host a great opening night. The networking skills she learned at Miami were being put into action.

When I arrived, my friend approached me and said, “Oh, I’m so glad you’re here. See that guy at the bar? He just moved here from Houston. I knew him at Miami. When he called to say he just moved to Columbus, I invited him. He doesn’t know anyone here. Go talk to him.”

I had never seen him before. He didn’t even look slightly familiar. Yet, our days at Miami overlapped for two years. How could that be? Doesn’t everyone in Oxford look familiar when you live in Oxford?

Comparing experiences, we had so many similarities, but we had always just missed each other. We both spent our freshman years in East Quad, but two years apart. We both washed dining hall dishes for our spending money, but in different dining halls. We studied in different libraries. I was a communication major, he was a business major. Slim chance of a common class. Our common but separate experiences in Oxford gave us plenty to talk about.

A one-year courtship was followed by a six-month engagement and almost 19 years of marriage (and counting). Our oldest son is now a senior in high school and will soon be making his college choice. We have visited lots of college Web sites and been on many college tours. Miami is on his short list, but the choice will be his. I chuckled on the campus tour when the guide proclaimed that 11 percent of students at Miami are products of Miami Mergers.

“That’s you,” I whispered! He wasn’t amused. He doesn’t get it. But that’s OK. Neither did I at his age.

Victoria Sheridan Hart ’83 lives in Dublin, Ohio, with her husband, John Hart ’81, and their two children.

Outstanding professor, exceptional mentor, wonderful man

By Sandy Siegel ’73

Editor’s note: Dr. George H. Fathauer ’40 taught at Miami for 34 years, retiring in 1982. He died in 2007, only a few months after his wife, Johanne Wainwright Fathauer ’42, passed away.

I graduated from Miami in 1973 with a major in cultural anthropology; Dr. Fathauer was my professor and my mentor. When I characterize Dr. Fathauer as my professor in anthropology, I mean that literally. The anthropology-sociology department in those days was quite small, and I took more than three-quarters of my major credit hours from Dr. Fathauer. The breadth and depth of his knowledge and experience in anthropology was quite remarkable. It is more than unusual to have so many courses taken from one professor at a major university. In our case in anthropology, I can say, unequivocally, that our educations and our careers were significantly enhanced by this circumstance.

Dr. Fathauer represented everything good about the academic experience at Miami University. He was a graduate of Miami in 1940; he loved Miami. He was an excellent and well-respected anthropologist. He received his doctorate from one of the premier anthropology programs at the University of Chicago, and he studied under Robert Redfield, one of the most prominent anthropologists of the 20th century. Dr. Fathauer was an anthropologist at a time when people in the discipline knew each other on a first-name basis. He could have taken a position at a large university with a prestigious graduate program and where the focus would have been on the doctorate programs and research. Dr. Fathauer chose to teach at his beloved Miami University and devoted a career to undergraduate education.

He was most definitely a professor from the “old school.” His relationships with students were formal and professional. While Dr. Fathauer lectured to classrooms full of students who wore the uniform of the day — long hair, torn or patched blue jeans, T-shirts — he came to class every day wearing a sport coat. His classes were demanding and his expectations were very high. His theory seminar was rigorous. There were approximately 10 anthropology senior majors taking his yearlong seminar. He announced at the beginning of the course that his intention was to teach us anthropological theory and to prepare his students for graduate school. Throughout that year, we read a tremendous amount of material and produced a paper each week. I went on to receive a master’s degree and doctorate in anthropology, and throughout my graduate education never learned more or worked harder than I did in Dr. Fathauer’s theory courses.

Dr. Fathauer shaped my academic interests, and he did so with few words. His specializations were Native American studies and culture and personality. Dr. Fathauer did his fieldwork research with the Mohave. His guidance and influence were expressed with encouragement and derived from respect, admiration, and his unbridled passion for the subject matter. My anthropological specializations were Native American studies and culture and personality; I did two years of fieldwork studying a plains tribe on a reservation in north central Montana. After I returned from my fieldwork, I maintained contact with Dr. Fathauer. I came to Oxford on more than one occasion to speak to Dr. Fathauer’s anthropology classes about my fieldwork research experiences.

Dr. Fathauer was a gentle man. As an anthropologist and as a Native American expert with a very close and emotional connection with the Mohave and other tribes, it caused him some considerable conflict and discomfort that the university he so loved should have a nickname that from his perspective was insensitive and racist. Dr. Fathauer regularly made this discomfort known to the university administration and he explained his rationale for the need to make the change. He did not make these protestations in a public way; that wasn’t his style. I have no doubt that he felt quite gratified when Miami adopted the new nickname and mascot.

George Fathauer was an outstanding professor, an exceptional mentor, and a wonderful human being. He touched my life in the most profound ways; he shaped my academic career and he influenced the ways I make sense of the world around me. Miami’s reputation for exceptional undergraduate education has been built on the dedication and devotion of teachers such as Dr. George Fathauer.

Sandy Siegel ’73 of Powell, Ohio, is president of the Transverse Myelitis Association.

How do you spell that?

By David Houghtaling ’63 MA ’64

Fifty years ago this past September I walked the obliquely configured walk (aka Slant Walk) at Miami for the first time. A presumed coed actually asked to take my picture on that first venture. Thus had I entered Candide’s best of all possible worlds.

From 1958 until 1964, I … 1.) studied mathematics to earn a BA (’63), and 2.) studied philosophy to earn an MA (’64). A difficult test question — for me — on parabolas early on should have convinced me that philosophically I was not going to be a mathematician: I drew a picture of a country bridge with a parabolic arch in my blue book to answer the aforementioned test question on parabolas. The professor was amused, but made it clear that the subject matter of the course was mathematics and not art.

So when Dr. Robert T. Harris, chairman of the philosophy department, offered me an assistantship to do a master’s in philosophy, like Candide, I chose what was best in this the best of all possible worlds and became a philosophy student.

Less than a year into my new found fate, Dr. Harris — with whom I shared an office on the third floor of Upham Hall — was called away suddenly to Chicago to arrange the memorial service for his recently deceased father. Just as suddenly, he handed me the text he was using in his semantics seminar and informed me that I would be teaching the class that afternoon.

I was familiar neither with the text nor the course. But in this the best of all possible worlds, I had nothing to fear … until I walked into the seminar room and found that one of the three students in the class was John Dome. I wrote my name on the chalkboard, explained my presence, and invited the students to enlighten me about semantics. [Editor's note: John Dome '36 MEd '53 was director of instructional resources, having started Miami's audio visual services department during Dr. Millett's presidency. Also an associate professor of geography, John taught the popular "Geography of Wines" course for many years.]

An hour later, I dismissed the class and set about to erase my name from the chalkboard. The last to leave the room was John Dome who congratulated me on my maiden voyage into teaching and then asked, “And how do you pronounce your name?”

In this, the best of all possible worlds, my mortification absolutely trumped all feelings of optimism when — as I turned to complete the erasure of my name — I discovered that I had misspelled it!

I am David Houghtaling, retired philosophy professor, and not David Houghtling, philosophy graduate student!

David Houghtaling ’63 MA ’64 lives in Everett, Wash.

Forging a new friendship

By Angie Spicer ’08

“I’m more nervous about this than I was about graduation,” I comment.

Everyone laughs and David Keitges, director of international education at Miami, smiles and says, “Rightly so.”

If you had told my mom that she would be mailing me a box of Esther Price chocolates for His Holiness the Dalai Lama just seven months after my graduation, she would have laughed — just like she did the first time I told her I was going to India.

I was honored to have been invited to the private audience held for the Miami delegate sent to Dharamsala, India, to sign the official study abroad agreement between Miami and Sarah College for Higher Tibetan Studies. This is where I first visited through the summer study abroad program Peoples and Cultures of Tibet and now teach English.

In what would have been my senior year had I not done the fifth final lap, I noticed the poster for the Peoples and Cultures of Tibet study abroad opportunity and signed up for it. My passport arrived the week before our flight, and my troubles didn’t end there. Once in Dharamsala, I contracted amoebic dysentery and was laid up in bed for a week.

My parents thought I was crazy when I told them I wanted to go back, and if it weren’t for the help of Dr. Sidky and Dr. Akers, I wouldn’t have gone to India the first time, let alone the second!

I was only supposed to stay for six months, but my love of the place and people kept me longer, even if it meant I had to travel alone to Nepal to get a new visa. I have made and will continue to make a lot of sacrifices being here. Miami is not a cheap school and as I am a volunteer, my parents have taken it upon themselves to help me out with my loan payments until I return to the States.

As the first Miami student to stay at Sarah for an extended amount of time, I was honored to have witnessed the first official act that Miami University undertook in 2009 — that of the signing of the agreement between two places I hold very dear to my heart. I am excited to witness the ways that more Miami students will be affected by their interaction with the Tibetan community, set in exile against an Indian landscape.

Most of my students are refugees from Tibet, having crossed the Himalayans at young ages in the middle of winter with only tsampa (a kind of roasted barley) to keep them going. Their contact with their families is extremely limited, and most of them will never see their parents again.

Others are Indian-born Tibetans struggling with identity issues of remaining a traditional Tibetan in a spicy stew of Bollywood culture.

I have students that, other than Sarah College, have never attended a school in their lives. Many come from farming families who cannot afford to send their children to school. Most of the students have international sponsors for their education.

My students’ perseverance, their loyalty, their intelligence, and their humor amaze me every day. They understand the importance of having a degree in this world, (they feel blessed at having such a chance), and many of them want to use their knowledge to become teachers.

With the new semester program between Miami and Sarah, more students like myself will learn about the Tibetan cause and the values of peace, freedom, compassion, and wisdom. Hopefully these students will then be able to open dialogue on an international platform regarding issues such as human rights, education, and preserving endangered cultures.

If you would like to help out the students of Sarah College, the best thing you can do is feed them! Dinner is always rice and dal, and lunches range from potatoes and tingmo (a kind of bread roll) to fried rice and soup. For about $100, you can sponsor a special lunch for Sarah’s 400-some students that includes rice and two different vegetable dishes.

Angie Spicer ’08 is from Lewisburg, Ohio. For more about her adventures, visit her blog.