Bobcat Attack - General Ohio University Discussion/Alumni Events - Ohio Professors who had the greatest impact on your life . . .

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Topic: Ohio Professors who had the greatest impact on your life . . .

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OhioCatFan

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Posted: 4/18/2022 9:09 PM

Last night I was thinking for some reason back to my college days and remembering the professors who taught me things that stretched my mind and made me think in new directions in ways that still influence my life today. In other words, I was making mental note of those I would term my best professors. I thought it might prove useful to list these on BA here in Siberia and ask others to list their best professors. Though several generations are represented on this board, many professors taught for 40 or 50 years, or even more, at Ohio. This means that there will mostly likely be some overlap in lists between those who graduated in different decades.

Here’s my short list, with name, general discipline, and specialty area in parentheses:

Robert Wieman, philosophy (metaphysics)
Danny Moates, psychology (psycholinguistics)
Guido Stempel III, journalism (areas too numerous to list)
Leslie Sargent, journalism (journalism law)
Hugh Culbertson, journalism (research methods)

As they do in Congress, I reserve the right revise and extend my remarks.

Who is on your list?

The only BLSS Certified Hypocrite on BA

"It is better to be an optimist and be proven a fool than to be a pessimist and be proven right."

Note: My avatar is the national colors of the 78th Ohio Veteran Volunteer Infantry, which are now preserved in a climate controlled vault at the Ohio History Connection. Learn more about the old 78th at: http://www.78ohio.org

Last Edited: 4/20/2022 9:51:07 AM by OhioCatFan

Scott Woods

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Posted: 4/18/2022 9:19 PM

I do not remember the names of any of my professors. They were that impactful.

Religion morality and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.

So enter that daily thou mayest grow in knowledge wisdom and love. So depart that daily thou mayest better serve thy fellowmen thy country and thy God.

mid70sbobcat

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Posted: 4/18/2022 11:08 PM

A mix of Profs from Undergrad and Graduate degrees.

Dwight Pugh, Business Law
Richard Voss, Cost Accounting
Helmut Zwahlen, Human Factors Engineering

Cellis033

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Posted: 4/18/2022 11:53 PM

As a current student, my top professors so far are these and I'm so appreciative and lucky to have them as professors:

Blake Regan, Mathematics
Thomas Chambers, Engineering
Jesus Pagan, Engineering

Chase
OU Engineering Technology and Management '24
Honda of America Assembly Equipment Engineer

Muck Fiami
Kant read, Kant write
Bowling Green Normie School
what even is Kron's mascot

BillyTheCat

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Posted: 4/19/2022 7:30 AM

Gifford Doxsee

Kinggeorge4

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Posted: 4/19/2022 7:34 AM

Delysa Burnier
David Descutner
Richard Bald

There were a few others that were visiting professors but the names escape me now.

GO BOBCATS
GEORGE

BillyTheCat

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Posted: 4/19/2022 8:06 AM

Cellis033 wrote:expand_more

Jesus Pagan, Engineering

Maybe the greatest name ever! Especially for a college professor!

OhioCatFan

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Posted: 4/19/2022 8:59 AM

BillyTheCat wrote:expand_more

Gifford Doxsee

I never had Gifford as a professor, but he was a friend and I learned a lot from him. He also my Sunday School teacher when I was of high school age. Great man!

Kevin Finnegan

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Posted: 4/19/2022 1:09 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:expand_more

Guido Stempel III, journalism (areas too numerous to list)
Leslie Sargent, journalism (journalism law)

WHOSE (Who's) on your list?

Hoping these two didn't teach grammar. I'm guessing you didn't have Dr. Dru Evarts. She's the one that sticks with me constantly. The other would be Dr. Charles Alexander, whom I stayed in contact with once I graduated from OHIO.

CatsUp

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Posted: 4/19/2022 1:55 PM

Bill Day, Management - Including the fact I was extremely grateful to him that he took the time to write a very nice recommendation letter for me my last quarter. He did this despite not knowing me really all that well. He could have easily declined and I would have understood.

Dwight Pugh, Finance (in my case) - He made a rather dry and rigid subject like finance about as entertaining, and thus rewarding, as it could be. As I recall one never knew when he would have one of those “demonstrative, exaggerated and amusing teaching moments” that always seemed to peak my interest.

I also vividly recall (except for the name) a physics prof (1976ish) who told us that we could put as much information (formulas, etc.) as we could get on an 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper to have for our use during the final exam. During his walk around the room during the exam he stopped at my chair, grabbed my sheet, and held it up for the class to see. From anywhere beyond about five feet it looked like a solid grey sheet of paper because of my diligence in including so much. As I remember I had sharpened my pencil about every 3-4 words as I was making it. He really seemed to have fun with it. Glad to include that it paid off :) I mention this because I always thought he recognized that knowing what to do with information was more important than memorization. That wasn’t the case as much as it should have been in many cases in my opinion. Perhaps someone remembers who this may have been.

bobcatsquared

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Posted: 4/19/2022 3:00 PM

Not the greatest impact, but definitely a lasting memory:

First words out of the professor's mouth on first day of Econ 101: "My name is Vishwa Shukla. And I don't speak English very good." He then went on to butcher over half of the names on a 200-plus roster. My uncertainty when I thought, but wasn't sure, he called my name is not unlike the students in this Key and Peele skit:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dd7FixvoKBw

Last Edited: 4/19/2022 3:01:00 PM by bobcatsquared

shabamon

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Posted: 4/19/2022 3:33 PM

I forget the man's name, but he was a journalism professor who taught my Information Gathering class in the mid-2000s. Essentially, how to find sources and how to truly conduct research. He's not on the faculty page on the Scripps website. The class was notorious for having a certain huge project account for more than half of your grade, but he taught the material in a way that made it not so scary. I still am able to use the material despite having long left the journalism world and now work in military software (go figure).

I've told OCF this, but I had his wife for an English class and still use her tip to write, in her words, a "shitty rough draft" any time I need to write anything of significance.

Mike Johnson

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Posted: 4/20/2022 6:42 AM

Leslie Sargent. The course was Contemporary Thought & Development and at its core were research and writing. What set Sargent apart from other professors was the way he graded our writings. In the margins, he annotated WHY he had edited the way he did. In other words he worked to improve not only writing but the thinking that precedes it.

Part of the research required attending the Kennedy Lecture Series. I recall going to listen to General Maxwell Taylor, George Lincoln Rockwell and Pearl Buck. Somehow, Sargent was able to induce Ms. Buck to come to our class the morning after her speech.

http://www.facebook.com/mikejohnson.author

Mike Johnson

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Posted: 4/20/2022 6:49 AM

BillyTheCat wrote:expand_more

Gifford Doxsee

I didn't have Gifford as a professor, but years later we became friends. The roots of the friendship were my books. He came to a book signing that I was doing at The Little Professor. The store manager had set up a table and chair for me and ringed it with a semi-circle of chairs. Among the first to arrive and take a chair was Gifford. Another who joined was a professor who had written a bio of Harry Truman.

Gifford bought a couple books. Later he emailed me, asking if I would inscribe a couple more books that he wanted to send to a former student in Netherlands. Then came an invitation to visit him in his home - which I wound up doing several times. Among learnings were his WWII experiences that included becoming a POW.

When I asked if he would preview one of my upcoming books, he gladly did so and provided a blurb that then appeared on the rear of the dust jacket.

We stayed in touch as his health was failing, and I was saddened by the passing of a gentleman.

http://www.facebook.com/mikejohnson.author

OhioCatFan

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Posted: 4/20/2022 9:49 AM

delete . . . duplicate [/QUOTE]

Last Edited: 4/20/2022 9:57:44 AM by OhioCatFan

OhioCatFan

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Posted: 4/20/2022 9:50 AM

Kevin Finnegan wrote:expand_more

OhioCatFan wrote:expand_more

Guido Stempel III, journalism (areas too numerous to list)
Leslie Sargent, journalism (journalism law)

WHOSE (Who's) on your list?

Thanks for the proofreading. I've made the correction. Sometimes my fingers don't type what my brain knows.

spongeBOB CATpants

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Posted: 4/20/2022 10:15 AM

Packy Moran FTW

OhioCatFan

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Posted: 4/20/2022 10:31 AM

spongeBOB CATpants wrote:expand_more

Packy Moran FTW

Looked Packy up and found this interesting blurb about him on the Iowa site:

https://clas.uiowa.edu/hhp/people/packy-moran

I like that they give our Alma Mater credit as "the birthplace of Sport Management education."

spongeBOB CATpants

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Posted: 4/21/2022 12:31 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:expand_more

spongeBOB CATpants wrote:expand_more

Packy Moran FTW

Packy is one of the nicest human beings I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. His dedication to development of his students goes well beyond lectures.

Also one of the most loyal Bobcats I've ever met. I was very sad when I found out he was leaving for Iowa but it brings me joy knowing he is still spreading the good word about OUr Beloved.

giacomo

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Posted: 4/21/2022 4:26 PM

Art Marinelli who taught business law. He always found time to speak to me and give me advice. There were others, of course, but he stands out.

OUs LONG Driver

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Posted: 4/21/2022 8:48 PM

giacomo wrote:expand_more

Art Marinelli who taught business law. He always found time to speak to me and give me advice. There were others, of course, but he stands out.

Looking back the ones I remember were the ones that actually made me work hard. I will never forget Rudy Pasic for many reasons. He blew my mind talking about X dot for like two weeks before I figured out that was another way of representing a derivative. He had a habit of doing about 25% of the work on the board then saying a fool could finish it and it wasn't worth his time to do so. He also hurled insults and chalk at us at a high rate of speed so that was fun.

Frank Kraft guided me through rough times in the ME department during plagiarism gate to get my Masters so I probably owe him the most.

Largest impact on my life was actually my wife's adviser who told her she shouldn't bother applying to medical school, and the decision makers at OU that denied her even a courtesy interview after she did apply. Big mistake Bobcats. That permanently soured her on Ohio University. Athens she still loves, but will never come around on the school. She went on to medical school elsewhere which is where I landed my first job and still work there today although moved around some for that and my wife's training. Wife is now NIH trained under one of the founders of her field, board certified (about to be double board certified). Had she gotten into OU Medical school I probably stay for a PhD and our lives would be different although I kind of doubt better. Things happen for a reason I suppose.

mf279801

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Posted: 4/21/2022 10:40 PM

I’ve got to go with:
Mary Chamberlain (Biology/ElectroPhysiology)
Fritz Hagerman (Exercise Physiology)
Vedder (Econ)

MonroeClassmate

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Posted: 4/21/2022 11:59 PM

Love this question!

Weldon Witters, Zoology, freshman year, Fall Quarter 1973. I came to OHIO wanting to become an athletic trainer and switched out of that program after this course--but it wasn't all without benefit.

He lectured on the topic of human reproduction and I was all ears. I had never been curious about a female's menstruation cycle or the potency for male sperm. He gave specifics on timing such as the several days of maximum fertility for the female and how recent a male should have ejaculated to be most potent. I wasn't even taking notes, this was being seared into my brain.

Fast forward, my wife and I didn't want kids right away in 1985 so we decided to wait. I wasn't bold enough to use a rhythm method based on what I had learned in the fall of '73 BUT in 1988 when it was time to try to have our first little one, I instructed my wife on the details and she got pregnant that June on the very first time we tried just following Professor Witters facts to increase the probability.

The next child didn't work as directed and took till the second month of trying.

Thanked God and Professor Witters for both! The third one, we didn't care so just experimented trying at every opportunity!

cbus cat fan

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Posted: 4/22/2022 11:39 AM

Richard Bald
Delysa Burnier
John Gaddis
Raymond Gusteson
Frank Henderson
Ursula Lawson
Richard Vedder
David Williams

The bulk of these are Political Science and History professors with the exception of Vedder in Economics and Lawson in German. They cross the political spectrum but they taught me a great deal, even if I didn't always agree with their viewpoints.

Special Mention to Paul Milazzo of the History Department who came after I left my undergrad and grad days, but I have taken some of his summer classes and he's as good as they get.

Last Edited: 4/22/2022 11:44:35 AM by cbus cat fan

OhioCatFan

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Posted: 4/22/2022 12:24 PM

cbus cat fan wrote:expand_more

Richard Bald would probably have made my list, except the class I took from him was during my "sophomore slump" where one semester I earned a 1.0 GPA. So, the fact that I didn't get what should have out of his class was not his fault but mine.

There are two things, though, that I will never forget about his class:

1. The day of the JFK assassination I heard about the shooting on my way to his class. At that point we did not know how seriously the president had been wounded. As we sat in the class a student in back row kept his transistor radio earphone in his ear. After about 35 minutes, he raised his hand, and announced to the class that, "The president is dead." The class was dismissed and we all wandered out of Bentley Hall in a collective daze. As I left the classroom, I glanced over at Professor Bald who looked perplexed and very profoundly sad, with a look in his eye that told me he was remembering the days of political upheaval in his native Germany.

2. In one of his lectures he was discussing the WWII Era (don't remember the exact topic of the lecture) and he broke into tears as he recalled an assignment his troop of Hitler Youth was given at one point late in war -- burying some bodies. I'm not sure his age at that time of this incident, but I think he was 8 or 9 years old. It was obviously a very searing and painful memory that he probably had not intended to mention, but somehow it came out. He quickly regain his composure and completed his lecture.