Interview with Janice L. Strauss

Strauss, Janice L. ; Gashurov, Irene

Janice is a Niagara Falls native. She worked as a Spanish teacher in Broome County.

2017-12-14

In Copyright

2017-12-14

Oral Histories from 60's Binghamton Alumni

60:14 minutes

Alumni Interviews
Interview with: Janice Strauss
Interviewed by: Irene Gashurov
Transcriber: Oral History Lab
Date of interview: 14 December 2017
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(Start of Interview)

IG: 00:03
You will keep track of time? Okay. So-so please tell me your name, your birth date-

Third speaker: 00:05
Yeah.

JS: 00:13
Okay.

IG: 00:14
-and where, and where we are.

JS: 00:16
I am Janice Strauss, and my birth date was December 17, 1946 and we were in my home in Endicott, on Bean Hill Road.

IG: 00:29
So, could you tell me where you grew up?

JS: 00:34
Well, I was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but only lived there for five years, and my parents moved to Niagara Falls, New York, and that is where I grew up, in an infamous area now called Love Canal, which we did not know about at the time. [laughs]

IG: 00:49
So-so could- when did you come to Harpur College?

JS: 00:55
I came to Harpur College in 1968, no 1964-1964 I graduated in 1968. Came in the summer of 1964 because Harpur College was still on trimester. And so, they had three semesters a year, one the first one started in July of 1964.

IG: 01:20
So, what- do you have any memories, sort of, you know, brief snapshots of what the campus looked like when you first arrived, or, you know, from-from the time that you were there?

JS: 01:30
Well, it was certainly much smaller than it is now. It was all red brick. The buildings were all red brick. There were none of these other designs. Um, and it was in perpetual- it was under a state of perpetual construction. There was always an area that was being added, um modified. I remember them planting trees one summer and pulling them out the next year because they were going to put a building right where they had just planted the trees. So, it is constant-constantly changing.

IG: 02:07
Great planning.

JS: 02:08
Yeah, we wondered [inaudible] wise guy, college kids, every once in a while, wondered about that. [laughs]

IG: 02:15
So um, what were um- what was- tell me what were some of the significant events during the time that you were there that you remember that stand out? Um, historical events?

JS: 02:31
Oh, historical events. Well, the entire time there was overshadowed by the Vietnam War, protests. People constantly leaving campus to go on busses to Washington, DC, running around, borrowing things from other people, everything from handkerchiefs in case they had to be prepared for tear gas to-- we were all rummaging through things to find things to send them off. As far as campus itself, we had a visit from Governor Rockefeller, Nelson Rockefeller at the time, because he had a hand in expanding campuses all over the state. And sometimes they called it Rockefeller's rock pile or mud pile, because with all that construction and building, something was always torn up in a mess, and when it rained, it would be muddy and-and I remember that a lot--people being concerned about that. Other significant historical events, the one that just hangs over my head is Vietnam.

IG: 02:35
And how did you feel about the Vietnam War?

JS: 02:38
I thought it was a dumb idea. Then I know that I know more, I think it was an even dumber idea. [laughs] I was not- I was still a little green. I just knew that we were sending a lot of people over there to kill other people, and the domino theory was-was right up front and center at the time. Our government was constantly telling us that if Vietnam fell to communism, then the whole rest of Southeast Asia would become communists, and we had to be worried and concerned about that. But even then, it was clear that it was a guerilla type war that our government did not even understand, and yet, standing back and looking in, you could see what was happening and-and the- the um- and it made for-for so many more deaths, because we did not seem to understand the strategy. We were fighting two different wars, and it meant that more people were being killed on our side, and more people were being killed on their side as they dumped Agent Orange. And I even remember us protesting against the Dow Chemical corporation because they were producing Agent Orange-

IG: 04:50
During your time on campus?

JS: 04:52
Yes-yes. So that was the biggest thing by far.

IG: 04:56
Do you think that you became politicized on campus? Was, or did it stem from your upbringing?

JS: 05:06
More so on campus-- just before I went to Harpur College, I had been an exchange student to Ecuador, and that opened my eyes. That was, that was the beginning, because then I saw what was happening to USAID money. Money was not going to the common person. I learned a different way to think-- everything from as simple as a space you know how we are sitting right now, we were fairly comfortable not in Ecuador, if you were friendly, you have to be here different. And because of how I was raised, I take a step backward, and they would take a step forward, and pretty soon I would be against the wall every day. [laughs] Things that you never thought about at all. I was very green when I went to Ecuador, and that started me thinking more along political and different lines. Kind of opened my eyes that there were there were different things out there that I never knew about.

IG: 06:01
So, you spoke Spanish before you went to Ecuador.

JS: 06:07
No-no, I had studied three years of German, [laughs] a year of Latin, a year of Latin, and three years of German. And yeah, I learned it quick, quickly, very quickly, um, yeah. So-

IG: 06:19
Obviously, a talent for languages.

JS: 06:22
Yeah, so when I came- eventually became a Spanish teacher.

IG: 06:27
What? What did your- what was your home life like? What did your parents do?

JS: 06:33
My dad was a factory worker. He worked for DuPont. It was a terrible job. I did not totally realize it and appreciate it at the time. At that time, though, they paid laborers decently so they could earn a living-- we had a small house. We owned our own home. I was the oldest of five kids, and my mom, for most of my childhood was a homemaker. It was only when they started cutting back at DuPont, and my father got a lesser job, but my mother went back. She already had her college degree, and she went back into teaching. And so, when I was in high school, my mother went back to work but I was the oldest. The youngest was only in kindergarten at the time, but- so I was- as the oldest child, I often took care of my younger siblings, but not until I was in high school. I mean, I led a pretty sheltered life, quiet, lower middle-class neighborhood, with my dad working his tail off, I think, which eventually killed him. He died when he was only 62 and by then, his hair roots had started to turn green from all the chemicals and he made, he made sodium for DuPont, and they did something called tickle the cells, which meant that they stirred up big, giant furnaces, and the sodium would pop up at them. And you would see them hanging out as you drive by the factories, you would see them hanging out the windows trying to breathe better. And I did not appreciate when he brought- he wore long underwear every day to protect himself from the burns. And when he came home each night, you could ring the sweat out there was that much. I mean, that is so you can imagine how hot it had to have been inside and all that kind of stuff. And as a kid, I do not- look back and look back at it. As an adult, I can appreciate so much more what he did and what he went through than I did as-as-as a kid, you know, but there were a lot of those in Niagara Falls.

IG: 08:35
It was a family that valued education.

JS: 08:38
Very much so. Yeah-yeah.

IG: 08:42
Because you went on to college and became a Spanish teacher. And your siblings?

JS: 08:46
They all went to college-- all of them. I have a brother who has just retired as a- was a registered nurse. I have a brother who became an engineer. Lives in Boston. He worked for the EPA up until this year. I have a sister who was a systems analyst who has retired and now lives here. She lived in New York City her whole adult life, and my youngest sister got a degree in accounting and did the books and things for a car company. So yeah.

IG: 09:19
So, returning a little bit to campus. What was residential life like? Who were your friends? You know how did you spend time outside of class?

JS: 09:35
Well, we made lifelong friends.

IG: 09:36
Yes.

JS: 09:37
I pulled this out in case you wanted to see. I did not know how this works, so I did not know what you wanted to see or do. [crosstalk] Oh, whatever works for you. But um, we have, we still have at least a dozen friends or more from-from those days-- that people we met on campus. Um, at the time, and I think it still is-- Harpur College was a geek school, and anytime you were not studying, you knew somebody else was studying and screwing up that bell shaped curve that you had to get over that hump [laughs] it was going to be- your grades were not going to be so good. And so, there was a lot of pressure, and we released pressure in good ways, fun ways, silly ways. I am not even sure they are acceptable today, the guys had, well, we had a curfew.

IG: 10:09
Yes.

JS: 10:10
The women had a curfew, which was- we were on campus this fall, the ladies were shocked. They said you had a curfew, because my wise guy husband had said to them, oh, we used to lock up the women. And they laughed. And when I was going like this with my arms folded, they looked at me and looked back at him and said, “You are not kidding.” And he said, “No,” he was not kidding. We had a curfew at 11 o'clock, and then the guys went out. When they came back, they would do things like have panty rays. You familiar with those? Oh my gosh, they the guys would come back, they would maybe been to town for a couple drinks or something, and so they were having fun, and they knew all the women were locked up in the dorms, and they come under our windows, and yeah, "We want panties. We want bras" and-and girls would throw them out. And-and I thought it was so dumb and silly. I went down to the basement one time with my roommate, and this is how we bonded and did so many things together. You asked, you know what? What it was like? We went into the lost and found in the laundry room, found some old bras, got some name tags. A lot of these young men had been in summer camps, and they had their names sewn in all their clothes. So, we took some of those labels out of their clothes and sewed them onto the bras and shot them out the window. So, the bra had a guy's name a label on it. And it was really funny, because the next day, some guy would come up to another guy and say, I found your bra last night. [laughs] So we did goofy, silly things like that that were just, you know, let off steam, but did not take too much time. [laughs]So that is kind of stuff we did.

IG: 12:10
So, you know, how did you feel about curfews at the time?

JS: 12:15
Even at the time, I found it annoying. You found annoying, but you just sort of accepted it, like we did not have any demonstrations about it, or anything like that, but I remember being especially annoyed with him one time. I still married him anyway. Because, because my roommate had been kept out late by her boyfriend. She had been saying to him, "I have to get back for curfew."

IG: 12:35
Right.

JS: 12:36
And um, he brought her back late, and at 11 o'clock they locked that door, man-- you could not get in. So, you had to ring the buzzer, and the house mother would come to the door. The head resident would come open the door, write you up that you would come late, and you got sent before the judicial review board for your punishment. So, he was on the judicial review board, all right, so he knew me, and he knew that I had in my closet, in my room, things for making cookies. So, he used to everyone, so I will make cookies in that little kitchenette in the basement. So, he sentenced her to make chocolate chip cookies for the entire dorm. And they all thought it was really funny we were- so I helped her. We were down there steaming the whole time while we made these chocolate chip cookies for the whole dorm. [laughs] In a sense, the punishment was silly, goofy, but we were still annoyed. [laughs]

IG: 13:32
Right. And apparently that a peer of yours made-

JS: 13:36
Right. [laughs]

IG: 13:37
-made the judgment-

JS: 13:38
Yeah-yeah.

IG: 13:41
What were some of the expectations for you, for, maybe for-for you when you went to college, before going to college? So did you think of having career-- what was nor- the norm for women at the time, or maybe you were outside of the norm-- because of your Ecuador experience.

JS: 14:00
And, yeah, in my group, and in-in, you know, this lower middle-income kind of thing, not everybody went to college. A lot of them went off and started working right away. But I remember my father, who got drafted out of college and never finished college. I think that is one reason he ended up as a laborer, telling me how proud he was that I was the first person on his side of the family to ever graduate from college, and he was very excited that I was going to college. And so, what expectations were just that I would do well. I had really good grades in high school. I did not have really good grades at Harpur. I had, I struggled to get over that hump on the bell-shaped curve. I remember one time getting 91 points out of 100 and it was a C plus. And I was so upset, I went to see the professor, and I handed him my paper, and I said, "Look, I only missed nine points on the whole test." And he pulled out of his drawer a graph and went through from the graph for my class, and said, "Look at this graph." And I looked at it, and the majority had gotten 90 or above. And he showed me how I fell exactly, just above the hump that he called a C, with that 91 points. And that is how they did the grading. He graded. He-he charted the-the grades of every student along this curve, and that is how you received your grade, not how many points you got on a test, but where you fell on that bell shaped curve. And I remember being so frustrated. [laughs] I did find the actual system there pretty frustrating. Even when I was there, when I look back on, I go, "Huh," but even when I was there, I remember thinking, this is really annoying. [laughs]

IG: 15:48
So, at the time, did Harpur College have a reputation of being a tough school academically?

JS: 15:55
Yeah-yeah. In fact, my guidance counselor at my high school called Niagara wheatfield. I lived at- the name of the town was actually Wheatfield, right outside of Niagara Falls. I remember my guidance counselor saying to me, “You are not going to get in there.” But I did get accepted and-and so I went. But I think with a 90, with a lower 90 high school average, I was on the lower end of the people accept it at Harpur College. So, I struggled, but I graduated, and some of those other people did not. [laughs]

IG: 16:27
So, do you think that they did not graduate? Did Harpur College have also the reputation of being a party school or?

JS: 16:34
No, not at all. No, not at all.

IG: 16:37
Very studios.

JS: 16:37
Yeah, no.

IG: 16:40
What did you study?

JS: 16:42
Well, mostly Spanish [crosstalk], but I started [crosstalk]

IG: 16:46
[inaudible] academically [inaudible]

JS: 16:48
Um, it was tough, but it was um, not what I expected. I expected I had come back just from Ecuador, speaking a lot of Spanish, and I wanted to build on that and improve on that. And instead, it was strictly a literature curriculum. It was read-read-read-

IG: 17:02
Right-right. In English?

JS: 17:08
-and no in Spanish.

IG: 17:10
Uh-huh.

JS: 17:10
You would read the novels in Spanish, but some professors conducted class in English and some in Spanish. It was, it was a mix.

IG: 17:18
Right.

JS: 17:19
And so, it was not what I had hoped. I had hoped to get much stronger in my Spanish, and I developed some strengths from the reading, some vocabulary, but not- I did not become [crosstalk], yeah, I- we did not- I took every conversation course they offered while I was there--usually they were only two credit courses, where our courses at the time were four credits.

IG: 17:41
Right.

JS: 17:42
Because they were on that trimester thing. We had four courses each semester, and each course was worth four credits. So, we did 16 credits per semester, and they only offered these two credit conversation courses, and I think I wound up with a total of eight credits in conversation. So, it was not exactly what I had hoped I still had the opportunity to use the language, but it was different than what I expected.

IG: 18:05
Do you have any professors that stand out in your memory as being exceptional?

JS: 18:13
Oh, absolutely. A bunch of-

IG: 18:15
Give us some examples.

JS: 18:16
-bunch of them who are excited in what they did and very good. And there was a fellow who died shortly after I graduated. His last name was Bachelor, Dr. Bachelor, and he was so enthusiastic. He would read these books and say, does not this like tug at your heartstrings. I mean, what motion [crosstalk]

IG: 18:33
Remember the books that he went-

JS: 18:35
Oh, God. That is tough.

IG: 18:36
What were the classes? the literature [crosstalk]

JS: 18:40
What were the classes-

IG: 18:40
The literature classes? What-what writers did you...

JS: 18:45
Oh, my goodness, that is tough. I remember that the categories, I remember we did one whole thing on-on South American literature, one on the Golden Age in Spain. I mean, the courses that they were centered around those particular things. I mean, we read all the classic ones. Read Cervantes, if you can believe it, we read the Quixote from start to finish-

IG: 19:07
That is incredible.

JS: 19:07
-three-three tones. [laughs] There was a lot of reading, a lot.

IG: 19:13
For- you know, how many people did you have, how many students did you have in a class--for example, by today's standards?

JS: 19:20
For example, by today's standards, pretty small, I am going to say between 15 and 20 in a class. Yeah-yeah.

IG: 19:30
So, what other, what other, you know, faculty really made an outstanding impression?

JS: 19:36
Oh, gosh, what I remember, hmmm [crosstalk]

IG: 19:41
-friends with anyone after you know-

JS: 19:44
Faculty, people?

IG: 19:45
Faculty, yes.

JS: 19:46
Hmm, I do not know that I did--Jeff did. I think Jeff actually went to a couple of their homes and things like that. But um, no.

IG: 19:57
So, you did not, you did not-

JS: 19:59
Yeah, I mean, on campus, we would visit with them and go to their office and talk with them. There was a German professor that I loved. I had to drop German after about a year because I could not fit in. If you wanted to graduate with a major in Spanish-

IG: 20:14
Right.

JS: 20:14
-you had to have another romance language.

IG: 20:16
I see.

JS: 20:17
And I could not carry three languages and still do all the other required courses that I needed.

IG: 20:24
So, which other romance language...

JS: 20:26
I picked up Italian. So, I did Italian for a while.

IG: 20:29
So, do you think that Romance were strengths of Harper College at the time?

JS: 20:35
Romance Languages?

IG: 20:36
Yes.

JS: 20:38
Well, they have very strong Romance Language department.

IG: 20:40
Very strong.

JS: 20:41
Oh, yeah, sure, yeah.

IG: 20:43
So, if you did not go to faculties' homes, you know what-how you know, what was your recreation like? You- did you belong to any clubs or organizations? How did you unwind? Yeah.

JS: 21:01
A couple clubs that- not a lot. Honestly, it was study-study-study. There really, was not-

IG: 21:08
Really?

JS: 21:08
-a lot of spare time for other things. We-we joined a few organizations, um, I belonged to the Newman Club, but they met maybe once a week for an hour.

IG: 21:19
What was Newman Club?

JS: 21:19
Newman Club was affiliated with the Catholic Church. Um and um, I cannot even remember what we did together. [laughter] Terrible. What-what sticks in my mind are the things we did together as friends, like that silly stuff I told you about the panty raids and-and, or one time when there was a terrible snowstorm, we all walked all the way from campus into Downtown Binghamton and found the only restaurant still open, and-and, you know, had had a good time there.

IG: 21:23
I see. What was Binghamton like at the time? Was it very rural or...?

JS: 22:01
No. Actually, I think it had more greater population than it does now. Actually, did not have the state- the tall state office tower buildings yet, or anything like that, but it was a busy place. But they did not- there was not too much town and gown mingling. They did not really care for Harpur College students. They-they always referred to us as the Harpur hippies.

IG: 22:25
Oh, I see, yes.

JS: 22:26
Um, when I went to the public library in Downtown Binghamton to get a library card, and she was very friendly and said, you know, fill out this form, do not worry. And I had put, you know, Box 187 Harpur College. And she went, "Oh, Harpur College," her whole demeanor, her whole tone, everything changed. I remember going for an interview for a job after I first graduated, and some kids hanging out of school, and some kids hanging out with school bus go, "There she is. There she is. That is the Harpur hippie. That is the Harpur" and I did not look like a hippie other than that. I had long hair, but that was about it.

IG: 23:01
That is, that is very interesting, and it opens up a number of questions. So, you would go to the public library, would you, you know, would you use the library on campus? And what was it like?

JS: 23:17
Oh, yeah, I go to the public library for novels and things like that.

IG: 23:21
Yeah.

JS: 23:21
I go to the one on Harpur College for everything else. All my school needs, whatever books we were supposed to read, or if I did not understand something I was reading, I would go there to look for an analysis of what I was reading. It was I looked at the one on campus much more academically. And by the way, there only was one I bring now, like I have lost track. Everybody has a library. The science building, there was just one, and it was all open stacks. And that is not true with all everything anymore.

IG: 23:51
Going back to Harpur hippie. So how did the college acquire this reputation? Was it for the anti-war activism, do you think?

JS: 24:02
I think in large part, I the first I remember hearing of Harper College back home in Niagara Falls or in the town of Wheatfield [chuckles] was when they sent people to protest the house on Un-American Activities Committee hearings in Washington, DC, and that is when they started to gain that reputation that they were this extreme liberal group, they did not use the term progressive back then or anything. But I remember people say- yeah, at that time, it was a small college. The reason I picked it is I applied at three state universities. First of all, only state universities, because they were the cheapest.

IG: 24:41
Yes.

JS: 24:42
And then when I was accepted at all three Albany, Buffalo and Harpur, I picked Harpur because it was the smallest, and you asked me about the class size-

IG: 24:50
Yes.

JS: 24:50
-that had, that had a lot of meaning for me, the fact that there was a lot of interpersonal exchange with the professors and all that kind of stuff. And to this day, I really appreciated that we got to know our professors.

IG: 25:01
Were your parents involved at all in your college decisions?

JS: 25:07
To the extent that they said I could apply anywhere I wanted, as long as it said SUNY in front of it.

IG: 25:13
Okay.

JS: 25:13
That was a financial. That was a financial.

IG: 25:16
Did they know about Harpur's sort of liberal reputation?

JS: 25:22
I am sure they have, they had heard of it. They were both well-read but-but I do not think they care.

IG: 25:27
They were fine about it.

JS: 25:28
Yeah, I do not think they cared one way or another. They did go with me once to visit the campus before I started there.

IG: 25:35
So, what did you do after you graduated? You said that you found a job as a school teacher. Did you go- so what was your just career and trajectory like? In essence-

JS: 25:52
Wow! That is, um...

IG: 25:54
Did you- were you a Spanish school teacher all your life, or...

JS: 25:58
Yeah, pretty much, although once I was, um into education--a flyer came across my desk for- from Nazareth College, which is based up in Rochester.

IG: 26:10
Right. Right.

JS: 26:11
But they were offering what they called satellite courses in Ithaca for English as a second language, and I always enjoyed that. In fact, I had volunteered to teach some kids at the public library who were who had come to this country, who needed English as a second language. And I enjoyed it. And I thought, well, that would be interesting. So, I took those courses and got certified in ESL as well. So um, that did me well, because I only worked part time for a while when my kids were little, and I had been working 80 percent at Union Endicott, when this flyer came across my desk, and then there was an opening out in Owego full time. And so, I moved out there, and they started using me as ESL as well, since I had my certification. And then when I retired from teaching Spanish out in Owego, um SUNY Cortland called and said they- their modern language department taught both Spanish and English as a Second Language, and they could use me with both certifications and all that kind of stuff. So, to this day, I still work part time for SUNY Cortland, and my ESL still serves me well, so I use both. I use.

IG: 27:25
Excellent.

JS: 27:25
Yes.

IG: 27:27
So, do you think um, that um, you mentioned that the school had a very strong academic reputation? How do you think that you know, it shaped you for your, you know, for your future life? Do you think it- could we say that-that it-

JS: 27:49
Oh, sure.

IG: 27:50
-a formative that you had a formative experience there, because some people just go through college without [crosstalk]

JS: 27:55
Yeah, I think some of the people who graduated did so because they learned I had to stick to it and really keep working hard and um, and it forced me to, create, develop that kind of persona-

IG: 27:56
Yes.

JS: 27:59
-where I am going to stick to it and I am going to get it and I- you know, I am going to get over that stupid hump on the bell shape. It certainly shaped me that way. For me that way.

IG: 28:26
Do you think that the liberal arts, you know, academics, open doors that-that would not have been opened otherwise, or is that fair to say?

JS: 28:36
Open minds-

IG: 28:37
Open minds, open minds...

JS: 28:38
-for sure. I to this day, I highly recommend that people have a kind of liberal arts education. You need to know about everything in this world. And when you get a liberal arts education, you are exposed to psychology, sociology, you name it. We had to have a little bit of everything in the first two years before we could go on and specialize. And I think everybody needs that if you are going to understand each other and understand other programs. And yeah, I would highly recommend it.

IG: 28:42
Is the open mindedness, what attracted you to your husband when you met him?

JS: 29:22
Open mindedness. Is he open minded? [laughs]

IG: 29:27
I am assuming. Well, I do not know. What attracted me to Jeff? I would say no. I would say more his well- yes, he had to be open minded if he was close minded. No, absolutely not. That would, that would be a detraction so that so I guess maybe you are right. I had not thought about it that way. It is more his gentleness, kindness, concern for other people. That kind of stuff is what really attracted me to him. How did you meet?

JS: 29:53
Um, he was a terrible language student, and this is true. [laughs] This is how we met. And I sat here, and he sat there, and he kept moving my arm because he did not understand anything the professor was saying. And he poked me [inaudible] "What did she say? What did she say?" So, I quick translated into English for him, and he would peek and see what-what I had done for homework. He did not get to move my arms during tests, though, or-or he would find out when I was going to the language lab. That was part of our classes too. So, he could sit beside me and because you would have these earphones on headsets, and he would say, "Okay, what did they say? What they say?" [laughs] And then, I remember coming back to the dorm one night and seeing him there, that guy in the Spanish class. Who does not know any Spanish?

IG: 30:42
When did you meet? When- remember, were you a freshman, or...

JS: 30:46
Oh, yeah, it was first semester. Because it was so small--the summer, the summer sessions were small because once you get accepted there, then you can pick what semesters you are going to attend. And many people just chose to attend two semesters a year rather than do the whole three in part because of the war, they did not want to graduate early, as long as they were a student, they still had a deferment. Um, so um, some people would go all three semesters. Some people would only go two semesters, and the summer semester, therefore was small, and you got to know almost everybody on campus, and he was living in the same dorm as I-- Johnson. And one wing, they called this a co-ed dorm. I know this isn't how it works now, but one wing was women and one wing was men, and the men were not allowed on the women's floor. The Women's were not allowed on the men's side, but that was our co-ed dorm. And after 11:00 curfew, there was some dispute as to who went where, but I seem to recall, the women were only allowed in the upper lounge, and the men were allowed in the lower area where the rec room and the snack machines were. Um, I guess it depended on which dorm you were in, because whoever was not allowed where the snack machines were would yell down and actually drop money and ask them to buy candy bars or something. We would throw them up. [laughs] So he was in the same dorm, so I saw him every time was coming and going, and then he was also in my experimental psychology class too. So.

IG: 32:24
Was he allowed to visit you in your dorm?

JS: 32:30
Well, I remember [crosstalk] he was, he was living in the same dorm, but he was only allowed in a men's wing, and we were allowed in the women's wing.

IG: 32:36
Oh, in other words, he could not come into the women's room.

JS: 32:40
No.

IG: 32:40
No, I did not [crosstalk]

JS: 32:41
I am going to say once, I do not remember exactly how often, but I am going to say about once a month they had open house. But even then, even then, if say I-I invited him to my room, which I was allowed to do during open house. When he came up, we were supposed to stand at the entrance to that floor and yell "Man on the floor" so that anybody could close their doors if they knew a man was coming through. So yeah, we did that. We yelled "Man on the floor," [laughs] and then he could come in and visit.

IG: 33:17
Did anybody think of contesting those rules, or you did not really...

JS: 33:23
I do not know. I remember when they opened the Hinman complex. Again, Jeff might be able to answer this better than I, with him being on a Ju-judicial review board and things like that. At some point the decision was made, and I do not know by whom to allow that to be a co-ed dorm where- again, only women in one suite and one floor, but we were, we were allowed to make our own rules. And so, we called them the self regs, because somebody first asked me which dorm I had lived in over there. And I said, "No, we call it the self reg" so um, [laughs] we actually made rules that-that did away with curfew for women over there. That was the that was a first on campus when we first moved into the Hinman complex. So that is when it started to change while we were still there. [laughs]

IG: 34:19
That is incredible. So, did you feel empowered?

JS: 34:22
Absolutely. [laughs] Yep.

IG: 34:27
So, getting back to Jeff, so how you know- how did your relationship develop? You know, did you become girlfriend and boyfriend in college or...

JS: 34:41
Yeah-yeah.

IG: 34:41
did you [inaudible] after graduation?

JS: 34:43
He invited me on a hayride, they actually had a hayride on campus. Yeah, that was our first date. Was on a hayride. And, yeah, it was on again, off again. Because this is the first thing that came to my mind when you said open mindedness. Jeff was Jewish and I was Catholic.

IG: 34:57
Yes.

JS: 34:58
Um, and it was not seemed to be a problem for my parents. My father was Presbyterian or something, and as far as my mother was concerned, that meant they were a mixed marriage, because we used to, they used to make fun of me because my mom called it a mixed marriage, and to most of the kids on campus, a mixed marriage was black and white or something like that. So, but we have done that DNA test, and Jeff is something like 97.6 percent Ashkenazi Jew. I mean, there was no mingling, and his parents were beside themselves that he was going to hang out with a "shiksa." [laughs] And so it was on and off again. We go out for three, four weeks. And then he-he would actually call and say, you know, we have to break up because, you know you are not Jewish and all this kind of stuff. And then he called me again, and he said, you want to go see the movie on campus. And I would say, "Is this a date?" He said, "Oh no, absolutely not." I said, "Oh, well, then who else is going," "Well, nobody else." And I say, "Sounds like a date to me?" "No, it is not a date." [laughs] So that is what I thought at first when you said, open minded.

IG: 36:10
No-no [inaudible]

JS: 36:11
It really did not play a role one way or another. [laughs]

IG: 36:16
So how long did it take you before he- before you became a couple?

JS: 36:23
That- it was definite that was on again off again, I am going to say, a couple of years before he decided, okay, it is on. He will tell you; it was my red hair. [laughs] I used to have red hair that he just could not resist. I do not know. [laughs]

IG: 36:40
So that that is, so that is, that is very interesting, and we are- I will ask him this question, but where is he from?

JS: 36:52
He is from Long Island.

IG: 36:53
From Long Island.

JS: 36:54
We were different economic strata as well. His dad was a CPA, and did very well.

IG: 37:01
Yeah.

JS: 37:02
And that bothered his parents, too. I am positive, but.

IG: 37:08
So, um, I think I am just thinking of what else I can ask you-- so-so you know, did your-your lives, your lives continued um, in Binghamton? You stayed both in Binghamton and your husband, found work here, and you settled down. Um, did you continue having ties with the college itself? I know that you have friends, but did you have occasion to, you know, visit for some kind of alumni event, or...

JS: 37:49
We still do, we still do. I think that is probably how you found this. We still go over. Yeah um, there have always been plays to see, concerts to do. And as we came to know more and more people in the community, even they would be a draw. For example, my son's friend was in the music program, and so we would go over whenever he was doing a recital, even if it was for his thesis or something, you know. So, there were all kinds of reasons to-to draw us over there. We have done partnerships with they have partnership program with foreign students, and we have done that several times.

IG: 38:28
Could you explain that?

JS: 38:29
Well, um, you just [inaudible] as an alumni. They will send you things, saying, "Would you help out with this program or something?" And if you say yes, then they match you up with-with a student. For example, there was a student, Shen-Shen Zhou, who's now going for her doctorate here. Who- when she first came here from China, they said, "Well, she has no family in the area? You would be in lieu of her family." If there is a holiday, and you know, there is- campuses emptying out, have her over. So, we had her for Thanksgiving, Christmas, things like that. And eventually she met an American guy and married him, but we went to the wedding and-and there was another young lady from Pakistan that we got matched up with, and she is now living in Boston, and she is- we are together on Facebook. We do not see her as much as we see Shen-Shen, but.

IG: 39:21
So-so um, you know, what was your activity with the students? Like, did you take them out to restaurants, or [crosstalk]

JS: 39:30
We brought them here.

IG: 39:31
You brought them here.

JS: 39:32
Brought them here. [crosstalk] No-no, they lived on campus.

IG: 39:36
But to have dinner here for the family.

JS: 39:38
Yeah. Uh-hmm.

IG: 39:40
Over what period of time?

JS: 39:42
Depended on who they matched us up with and how long they stayed here.

IG: 39:47
Of course, was this, after your- first of all, how many children and did- went to Binghamton, where did your-

JS: 39:59
[crosstalk] our own children?

IG: 40:01
Yes-yes.

JS: 40:02
My son went to- well, he started at Broome Community College.

IG: 40:06
Yes.

JS: 40:06
And graduated from Ithaca-

IG: 40:08
I see.

JS: 40:09
-in communications. So, he works for Channel 34 news station-

IG: 40:13
Oh! That is great.

JS: 40:14
-here, he is a news producer. He is not on camera, but he does- he makes commercials and all that kind of stuff, which is kind of fun, because when I see really bad one on TV, you know those car commercials that are so hokey, I will call and say, "Did you do that commercial?" [inaudible] "Mom, we do whatever the customer wants." [laughs] "I know what you are going to say." And our daughter that you met her already lives about five minutes down the road and is a secretary in the guidance office at Union Endicott High School.

IG: 40:44
Oh!

JS: 40:44
So, they are both- both local, which is very nice. That means our grandchildren are local.

IG: 40:51
So, they did not go to Binghamton University.

JS: 40:53
No-no.

IG: 40:54
I misunderstood.

JS: 40:56
No, they were there. They know of it, but yes, no, neither one of them attended classes there. No.

IG: 41:02
So apart from the foreign student program, do you look upon Binghamton sort of as a cultural center?

JS: 41:12
Oh, yeah, for sure.

IG: 41:14
After graduation.

JS: 41:14
Yeah, we have gone to plays, you know, orchestra type performances, some alumni events. Yeah, whatever we see is going on over there. We will, we will stop by, and we are sort of a hub for all these friends I told you about who now live everywhere else, like we really got together this fall. For many of them graduated in 1967. Jeff and I graduated in (19)68 but some of them went through that- went faster through the trimester program, and so this was their 50th, so they wanted to do something for their 50th. So, we had a house full, and we all met over on campus and attended some of the activities there.

IG: 42:03
So-so did you know, actually, did you have a vision of what your life after graduation would be like? Or did it kind of just fall into place?

JS: 42:19
For me, I cannot. I know a lot of people plan-plan-plan for me, it just kind of fell into place. After Ecuador, I decided I wanted to do something with Spanish. I was not even sure what, but I sort of started volunteering to work with kids and enjoyed the teaching. And right about the time we were ready to graduate, or just before, they created the MAT program, and it was like an opening, okay, we could do that. We both managed to get jobs teaching-- Jeff more because-

IG: 42:47
[inaudible] MAT program?

JS: 42:48
Masters in the Art of Teaching.

IG: 42:49
I see.

JS: 42:50
I think they still have it.

IG: 42:51
Yeah.

JS: 42:52
And, I mean, it has changed over the years. First, they had Spanish, then they did not, then they did. I think it was back. But Jeff, more so than I was looking at the teaching end of it, because you could still get a deferment from the war for being a teacher, and that was important, so important to so many of those young guys. And that is how he ended up in it. I just sort of naturally gravitated toward it because I liked it. And since we both got jobs here and had decided to get married. Right after we got our bachelors, we just stayed here and finished our masters. And his parents tried to get him to go to Long Island, but every time he goes down there and we get stuck in traffic, or there would be long lines, he would say, "No, I really do not want to live there." [laughs]

IG: 43:40
So, you know, how has- I am just wondering, how has Binghamton University changed over time? Harpur College changed over time in your perception of a better school, a better experience, or is there something missing?

JS: 43:57
It is different. [laughs] I mean, there are good things and there are bad things, if you recall, one of the things I liked the best was the smallness of it and how you could get to know everybody. That is no longer true. But then there are a lot more opportunities in so many different fields than there used to be. There did not used to be a school of engineering, there did not used to be a school of nursing. There did not- you know, all these now that there was one in pharmacy, they never used to have all those opportunities um, but it is so big now you can get lost over there. So, it, it is different. I mean, there is there is good and-and bad from-

IG: 44:36
Do you think most of your graduating class did well for themselves? The majority?

JS: 44:41
Yeah-yeah. Well, certainly, all the ones we have kept in touch with-

IG: 44:46
Kept in touch with.

JS: 44:47
Absolutely.

IG: 44:48
The ones with a strong liberal arts education?

JS: 44:51
Mm-Hmm, for sure.

IG: 44:53
So, what are the most important lessons that you have learned from the experience of going to Harpur College?

JS: 45:01
Goodness, what is the most- lessons. Huh. [laughs] I mean, I certainly learned a lot about how to deal with life. Um, I learned it- opened up my world. Remember, I came from that tiny little family in Niagara Falls. It started really with the exchange student experience, but it continued with-with Harpur. I mean, again, I found a culture that I was not familiar with. They caught- they actually called me for a while. Maybe he will remember the funny little upstate girl, because most of the people on campus were from downstate, and even that in and of itself, I found bizarre that they called me up upstate when they said they were coming upstate, when they were coming to Binghamton, to me, coming from Niagara Falls, coming to a place that borders with Pennsylvania, is downstate, and they said, "No-no-no-no-no, you do not understand it all." If you are anywhere north of Yonkers, you are upstate. In fact, even if you are in Yonkers, you are upstate. [laughs] So it was a culture that I was totally unfamiliar with, and was honestly a little scary at first. It was a different accent. They were much more outgoing and much quicker to criticize. I was kind of inhibited no longer, but I really was kind of inhibited and did not speak up, and learned to do all of that there. So that guess that partially answer your question.

IG: 46:31
Right. So, it is kind of an acculturation.

JS: 46:34
Absolutely, yep.

IG: 46:37
And I think you know, broadening experience. Um, what you know, what was the proudest memory from being at Harpur College?

JS: 46:50
That I graduated. [laughs]

IG: 46:52
That you graduated.

JS: 46:53
There were times when I was not sure that was going to happen. When I saw that a 91 was a c plus, you know, that I made it, but maybe that sticks out, you know, more than anything else, and my father coming to me that and telling me that I was the first person in his family to have graduated from college. Now my mom did, but he met on his side of the family. So.

IG: 47:21
Do you have any sort of concluding remarks? We still have your husband to interview. That is another [crosstalk]

JS: 47:29
Well, see if he says the opposite of everything. [laughs]

Third speaker: 47:34
I have a question.

JS: 47:35
Sure.

Third speaker: 47:36
You studied Spanish. Was there any Spanish speaking person in campus as a student at that time?

JS: 47:44
Yeah.

Third speaker: 47:45
Like someone from Spain or Latin America?

JS: 47:47
Well, there was a fellow that lived in our dorm that we were friends with. I do not know what happened to a Māori Cruise. He was from Cuba.

Third speaker: 47:54
Okay.

JS: 47:55
We hung out with him. Yeah, I encountered other ones, but I do not remember their names.

Third speaker: 48:01
[crosstalk] some-

JS: 48:02
Some, but not a lot.

Third speaker: 48:04
How about Black? Were there any [crosstalk]

JS: 48:06
Some, some, again, not a lot. One of our best friends was a guy by the name of [inaudible], and he was from what at the time was Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, and he had an interesting life. He was already in his 30s, but he was living on campus with all us youngsters, um trying to get his education, and eventually got his masters up at McGill because he needed a degree from some country within the British Commonwealth, so that when he went back to Zimbabwe, he could be successful, and I do not understand what happened to him, but he ended up in Belgium, I think so. I think there was no place for educated Blacks at the time in Rhodesia, Zimbabwe. I cannot remember exactly when it became Zimbabwe, but it was still Rhodesia when he was with us, but again, not a lot, not a lot.

IG: 49:05
So, with the exception of you know, you opened a whole other set of questions, but with the exception of you who have, who had international experience before coming to college, do you think the rest of the student community was pretty, you know, white and insular, and mostly came from downstage.

JS: 49:27
In my mind, a bunch of white downstairs. [laughs]

IG: 49:30
Yeah.

JS: 49:32
In my mind, yeah.

IG: 49:33
So, there were very few international students or students of color [inaudible]

JS: 49:38
I hope that is accurate, but that is how I remember it. Yeah. I mean, where are these folks? Go ahead, just look through the pictures. Well, this- these are Harpur College pages. At the time, Harpur College bought a place out in Halsey Valley--beyond Owego. And because Jeff was on the judicial review board, he knew who to talk to-to get the keys, and we would go out there, dorm room. I am sorry, you guys probably cannot see very much here. These are all Polaroids. Do you remember back when people used to do Polaroids? Jeff me, Jeff and me, Jeff and me. But this is at that place out in Halsey Valley. They called it Lake Empire. But what I am looking for- here we are--this was a duck- a boat race on the Susquehanna. Everybody had gone down there. Look at their faces. I do not know, folks. I am not seeing a lot of different ethnicities here. Well, there was Mach- there was Machana. We were good friends with him. He was, yeah-yeah. That is, let me see, that is Machana, yeah-yeah.

IG: 50:55
For the faculty, yeah, international, did you have-

JS: 50:59
Yes.

IG: 51:00
Yes, so your Spanish department. Where did they come from?

JS: 51:06
Senora Borgel was from Spain, itself, mostly Spain. One from Germany.

IG: 51:19
Spanish teacher, Spanish-

JS: 51:20
No, that was psychology, one from Switzerland. That was sociology. Where else they were from?

IG: 51:37
Did having that kind of international, small presence, you know, connect you to the wider world, or change your view of-

JS: 51:48
No not too much.

IG: 51:49
Not too much.

JS: 51:50
A little bit, but not a lot. Yeah, no, so you can see, yeah, you are right. They were mostly white, huh! Studying. Even when we were relaxing, we were studying. [laughs]

IG: 52:09
You were studying.

JS: 52:10
That is how I remember it. Somebody's always screwing up the bell-shaped curve pressure, but we are still good friends with him, with her, with her, her, both of them. They live up in Syracuse. Most of us met our spouses there.

IG: 52:29
Oh, really.

JS: 52:30
Yeah, kind of lost touch with her and her, but our resident, our head resident in our dorm, had was married and had a baby. That is that was his little one. His first name was Dean. Is that a bizarre name for a campus? Think about this. There were so many people that would say to him every time they saw him, hello, Dean Porter. And I know they thought the Dean was his title, not his name, but it was his name. He was not a dean. He was just the resident that had resident.

IG: 53:07
Where was this photograph taken on campus?

JS: 53:09
No, they, they took a break one spring and went, during spring break, went camping in the not Great Smokies, Shenandoah-Shenandoah area, down in Virginia.

IG: 53:27
So, did-did anybody- you did not have any foreign study programs at the time at Harpur College?

JS: 53:34
Yeah, they did go, yeah, um, one of the young ladies here, one of my roommates, went to- they had a program in Salamanca, Spain.

IG: 53:43
Yeah.

JS: 53:43
And, and they also had one in France. I am trying remember the name of the city. It will come to me later. Yeah, there were, there were programs like that where you could go for a semester and study abroad. But that was expensive. And, yeah, I never went because I did not have the money, yeah.

IG: 54:02
Subsequently, you went traveling and you saw these places, or some of those places.

JS: 54:06
Most of them, not-not-not Spain, so much. Jeff and I have been down- well, we have hosted many, many exchange students here in this house, long term exchange students-- mostly wrote rotary students, but from a couple other organizations as well. And we have had four from Brazil, so we went down to Brazil and visited them. While we were there, we went over to Argentina, just because we were close.

IG: 54:29
Wonderful.

JS: 54:30
We could see we have been to Mexico a whole bunch of times. I would go shopping. He would make fun of me, because when I was teaching, I would buy all the little trinkets on the street and bring them back for prizes and things in class. And I remember one time having a whole bag of them. And we got to customs, and Jeff and that guy said, "Well, what did you buy…?

IG: 54:51
Yeah.

JS: 54:51
-in Mexico." And Jeff looked at the guy and went, "Junk." And the guy just said, "Okay, I passed through." [laughs] So to this day, I still tease them about junk that was not junk, that was stuff for my students. [laughs]

IG: 55:05
But you kept up your language through these travels.

JS: 55:08
Yeah. So yeah, use it some that way. Yeah. We also get together with other Spanish teachers.

IG: 55:14
Oh, that is [inaudible]

JS: 55:15
Although we retired teachers are starting to lose it. We-we first got together when we retired, and we would speak all in Spanish during lunch, and then it got to be just a half hour. And the last time we forced ourselves to do 10 minutes. [laughs] It is not quite what it used to be, yeah.

IG: 55:32
Well, I can understand that language suffers from misuse.

JS: 55:37
I keep it up more on campus.

IG: 55:39
Yes.

JS: 55:40
When I go up to Cortland- and I go into the Foreign Language Department, we are much more likely to address each other. [crosstalk] Yeah.

IG: 55:41
I see. So, any concluding remarks? Do you have any outstanding memories?

JS: 55:55
No, the only thing that sticks in my mind, and I am not sure it is where you want to go with this, but how nice it was back then. You know how people are talking right now about this big deal, free tuition, free college, tuition, everything. We basically had that at Harpur College-- they only accepted you if you had an average in the 90s or so. And we used to take something called the regents exam, regions, scholarship exam, which no longer exists, and we all scored high enough on it that we all got a regent scholarship. And that regent scholarship paid our tuition. Our tuition was only $200 a semester, and but that meant for me, as a kid from a lower income family with five children, with just a factory worker dad and so on, I could go to college with no problem. All my tuition was covered. It was free. In that sense, room and board was more. I borrowed money for some of the room and board, and my parents paid for some of it, but it made it relatively painless to get through college, to get a college education, so that you could rise, in other words, you could have a mobile, social, economic society. And so, it is quite doable. It is quite possible. And I feel really strongly about that, that we could do it if we had the political will. I mean, it was done. It is not a first. We had it, [laughs] and I am very grateful for that, or I would not be here. [laughs] You know,

IG: 56:52
That is what it should be.

JS: 57:29
Yeah, so and Harpur College had that for sure.

IG: 57:34
And most, do you think that most kids had- were there on scholarship, or...

JS: 57:40
I' d say most of the kids on campus had a scholarship just because of our averages. Yeah-yeah. Jeff did, I did.

IG: 57:46
Academic scholarships.

Third speaker: 57:48
And that also made a huge difference, of course, campus life, because everyone was intellectually-

IG: 57:56
motivated,

Third speaker: 57:57
Same level.

IG: 57:59
yeah-yeah. for sure. So that is it. Well, good.

Third speaker: 58:05
Thank you very much.

JS: 58:07
Thank you. It has been fun talking about it. You know, and trying to make me think of things I have not thought about them. I will leave that here if you want something. Oh, this would be a better indicator you were asking about ethnicities and stuff. Just flip through it. This is the, yeah, look, it looks all white to me. Gosh, I never thought about that. Yeah, holy cow.

IG: 58:37
I think that was probably standard at the time. Do not you think?

JS: 58:41
I guess, I guess how sad. Kept touch with some of these people. Yeah, you are welcome to skim through it to see what you can find. But they are, they are broken up by-

IG: 59:02
Year?

JS: 59:03
No, by majors. And so, I wonder if there would be a difference, depending on whether you are looking at humanities or sciences or I will bet you find a difference between male and female. Betcha-betcha [bet you]. Find most of the females in the humanities part.

Third speaker: 59:21
Absolutely.

JS: 59:24
Anyway.

IG: 59:25
I love this. [laughs]

JS: 59:28
You want me, let me go get- yes, that was the other thing too. Do you know a lot of schools at that time were still insistent that everybody dress family for dinner? We were Harpur hippies. They did not have a dress code. You could wear jeans.

IG: 59:42
She breaks the mode.

JS: 59:43
At night and-and that is a little bit what-what they look like. [laughs]

IG: 59:48
Is it a little bit what you look like?

JS: 59:50
Oh, yeah. Jeans-

IG: 59:51
Glasses, jeans.

JS: 59:53
We all, we all, we were all nerds. We all have glasses. We-

IG: 59:57
She has sunglasses.

JS: 59:58
No, yeah, that is different.

IG: 59:59
[inaudible]

JS: 1:00:01
But we were all in jeans, yeah.

IG: 1:00:03
Boots.

JS: 1:00:04
Yeah, I did not do boots,

IG: 1:00:06
Yeah. Okay.

JS: 1:00:07
Yeah, let me go get the other guy and relieve him.

IG: 1:00:11
Thank you so much.

JS: 1:00:12
Send him your way.

(End of Interview)

2017-12-14

Irene Gashurov

1968

Janice L. Strauss

Janice is a Niagara Falls native. She worked as a Spanish teacher in Broome County.

Audio

Harpur College – Sixties alumni; Harpur College – Alumni in secondary education; Harpur College – Alumni from Upstate New York; Harpur College – Alumni living in Broome County.

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Harpur College – Sixties alumni; Harpur College – Alumni in secondary education; Harpur College – Alumni from Upstate New York; Harpur College – Alumni living in Broome County.