G. Robert Witmer, Jr.

Paul Burgett: Today is January 7 ^th 2016. I am Paul Burgett, vice president and senior advisor to the president of the University, and today we are interviewing G. Robert Witmer, Junior, who has a long and distinguished history here at the University. Bob, a term in the parlance—in American parlance that's very popular, especially amongst beloved people, is "favorite son," and as I think about your career at the University of Rochester, I cannot think of anyone who fits the description of favorite son more than you. A product of this community, educated in this community, who's lived a life that's been very diverse and interesting and made contributions to the University that we're going to ask you to elaborate on.

I think you clearly fit the description of Rochester's—one of Rochester's favorite son and certainly one of the University of Rochester's most favorite sons. Tell us a little bit about your life in Rochester and your coming to the University of Rochester.

G. Robert Witmer, Jr.: Thanks for that introduction, Paul. Actually, as you were speaking, I thought, "You know, he's got it almost right, but it really, I think, should be "favored son," in the sense of my upbringing and then my experiences here at the University. First, grew up in what was a fairly rural suburb of Rochester, Webster, at that time. I had the advantage—wonderful advantage—of having two terrific parents, each one of whom was intellectually very strong, inquisitive. They, at every stage, encouraged me to read, to ask questions, to explore in every way. My father had been the only one of four children in his family who went to college. He came here.

PJB: Class of?

GRW: '26. 1926.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[1]<![endif]> My mother was one of three daughters and a son whose parents owned and ran a farm in Livonia Center in Livingston County. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[2]<![endif]> Her father sent all three of his daughters to college. My mother<![if !supportFootnotes]>[3]<![endif]> graduated from William Smith, Phi Beta Kappa, in 1932<![if !supportFootnotes]>[4]<![endif]> and came eventually, after a couple of years, to teach school in Webster, where she met this young bachelor lawyer who had gone from the U of R to Harvard Law School and then back into the community<![if !supportFootnotes]>[5]<![endif]>

But they—not only did I have their example and their encouragement, but Webster at that time—there was a fairly small public school system, 107 in my graduating class. Probably a third of the boys still worked the farm, and what that meant was that I could do anything I wanted to do, maybe not well, but I was more than welcome to take a crack at sports, so I played football. I played basketball. I sang in the chorus, played in the school band, was in the school play. All of these things that unfortunately with our larger school systems these days seem to be beyond the opportunities given to many children. Certainly in sports and even in, I think, other activities, you need to pick your activity early in age and focus on it. I did not have to do that, and I think that that gave me a breadth of experience. It gave me some sense of — probably false — sense of accomplishment or security, but I had it.

I can recall that we would occasionally come up to the U of R for a football game and so forth. Didn't spend a great deal of time here at the University when I was in high school. Then fortunately did well in high school. Had the other advantage, as I think back on it, of having some very talented teachers, women who at that time—you could be a secretary or you could be a teacher. That was your—I guess a nurse. And the women who taught me at Webster by and large were very, very good, very strong, and inculcated in me, I think, a good sense of academic accomplishment as well.

I graduated valedictorian, chased hard by a couple of my classmates, one of 'em a cousin who was very much like a sister to me — we're the same age — and also played basketball. That was my — that was really my sport, although I played football. This is a story I know you've heard me tell, Paul, but —

PJB: Oh, I'm hoping you'll tell that story —

GRW: [Laughter]

PJB: — because I was charmed by it.

[Laughter]

GRW: Well, this is — this was my senior year. My junior year, I had made second team, all county, in basketball, so things were going well for me. I loved basketball. I had—again, my parents had put me into the Eastman School of Music. It was a community school where I took piano lessons until they started to conflict with my basketball. That was the end of my piano to—<![if !supportFootnotes]>[6]<![endif]>

PJB: Do you remember who your teacher was, by any chance?

GRW: Ed Easley. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[7]<![endif]>

PJB: Ed Easley?

GRW: Yes.

PJB: Who was also the director of admissions.

GRW: I was not aware of that.

PJB: Yes.

GRW: Okay.

PJB: Who admitted me to the Eastman School. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[8]<![endif]>

[Laughter]

PJB: You see? We have lots of connections, don't we Bob?

GRW: We—more and more. You're absolutely right. This was—my senior year was gonna be my year of playing basketball except we also—we had a good football team. I played football, and in one of the practices one of my own teammates ran across my—I was throwing a block and he ran across my back, and with his knee he broke one of the vertebral processes in my back. That put me into a ten-pound body cast from chin to hip for ten weeks. I'm sure that I was the world's worst pest with the doctor because that time, the end of ten weeks, basketball had already started, and I am bugging the doctor like you can't believe. "When can I play basketball?"

Probably to get rid of me as much as anything else, he said, "Well, I'll tell you what. You can play basketball when I take you out of the cast, end of ten weeks, but you have to put the cast back on every time you practice and play." So, at the end of ten weeks, they sliced the cast down the side, sprung it open. I mean you could smell me a block away. It was—oh, it was horrible by that time.

We would put that cast in the corner of the locker room, as far away from them—anyone else as we could, and every practice and every game, they would split the cast, put it back me, wrap it up with tape, put a quarter-inch of foam rubber around the outside, and send me out on the court. They would never let you get away with that these days, but they did. And, I was a force to be reckoned with underneath the boards. I mean no one gave me an elbow more than once. [Laughter]

PJB: You were armored, in a matter of speaking.

GRW: I was armored. I couldn't jump that high—

PJB: No. [Chuckles]

GRW: - and made second team all-county again, which—playing just the second half of the season with that ten pound cast. I had wanted to—basketball really was an important part of my life, and I wanted to play basketball in college. I was fortunate enough to be admitted to the U of R and to Princeton and to Harvard. Now this is before there was any D1, D2, or D3, and so you had some—your Ivy League, very good brand of ball, your Big Ten, your Pac-10, and so forth. I just thought, "I don't—I'm just not—I don't have the experience that will allow me to play ball in the Ivy League, and, after all, the U of R is a good school, my father went there, and I'd have a chance to play basketball," and so I came to the U of R.

One of the greatest illustrations of chutzpah, I think, I—there was a local Harvard recruiter here by the name of Russ Sibley. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[9]<![endif]> And I can still recall—he lived on Nunda Boulevard. Here I am—it had to be my senior year. It was, in high school. I went to tell Mr. Sibley that I was not going to go to Harvard. I was gonna come to the U of R. Not wanting to make him feel too bad, I said, "But I expect to go Harvard in graduate school. " I may have even said law school. I said grad school. When I think back on it, what a—just an asinine thing to say without any basis or knowledge and not realizing how—

PJB: Yes, but as it turned out. [Laughter]

GRW: As it turned—as it turned out, that's what happened, but—

PJB: Of course.

GRW: Certainly, if I had known then what I learned subsequently, I never would've made such a brash statement to Mr. Russell Sibley.

PJB: But basketball was an important feature in your decision to come to Rochester, would you say?

GRW: Oh, it was.

PJB: I mean that really helped draw the decision as much or more than anything?

GRW: I think that's true, and I've often said—half jokingly, really not jokingly—I made the right decision for all the wrong reasons because I—now as it turns out, I had a wonderful experience here, playing basketball, although I didn't quite realize at the time I made a decision how competitive it was going to be here at the University. I was—we had—I really was the number six person on the freshmen squad, although close six, and so I saw a lot of playing time, but we had Ted Zornow,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[10]<![endif]> who was a good basketball player, a great soccer player, All-American soccer player, on our team. We had Mike Copeland,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[11]<![endif]> who was perhaps the best natural athlete I certainly had encountered up until then. We had Gary Haynes and Bob Geyer<![if !supportFootnotes]>[12]<![endif]> who were terrific forwards, and Bud Stevens at center. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[13]<![endif]> I really had to work hard to stay within that group my freshman year. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[14]<![endif]>

PJB: This was a step up from high school basketball, wasn't it?

GRW: This was—it certainly was.

GRW: This was—the coach was Don Smith,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[15]<![endif]> the football coach, but he coached the freshmen squad. This was the year that Lyle Brown<![if !supportFootnotes]>[16]<![endif]> had been hired from Pittsburgh as to eventually succeed Lou Alexander. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[17]<![endif]> Lou Alexander was going to step down in a couple of years as coach of the basketball team, and Lyle had been hired. I think his primary responsibility was a soccer coach at that time, but he was the assistant varsity basketball coach, but he still would work with the freshmen team. Then my sophomore year was Lou's last year, and then my junior and senior years were under Lyle Brown as the coach.

PJB: Now, Don Smith became our golf coach. Right?

GRW: Yes. He was a football coach—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - and the golf coach.

PJB: And the golf coach.

GRW: Yeah. No. That's right. He was a wonderful.

PJB: Who were some of the teams that you remember we played against? Who did you play against?

GRW: Union, Hobart, Clarkson, St. Lawrence, Allegheny, Oberlin. Those are the ones—Alfred, I think. Hamilton. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[18]<![endif]>

PJB: Was the Hobart tradition still strong in those days? The rivalry.

GRW: [Laughter] It sure was. Hobart had a two army veterans—at least one of 'em was—on their team. Mendez<![if !supportFootnotes]>[19]<![endif]> and—I've forgotten the other's name. They had a very strong team, and we beat them a couple of times. I've got a very close friend who was at Hobart about that time. He couldn't believe it, that Rochester had beaten Hobart.

One time one of my classmates, Rich Leibner, who has never let the facts destroy a good story, so this one you need to take with more than a grain of salt. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[20]<![endif]> We are down in Geneva playing Hobart, and this was before Hobart even had its own gym. They played in the old DeSales High School gym. I can remember there was a—oh, his last name was—he was Johnny Gee or Johnny—he was a big, 6'9" referee. He had played and, I think, pitched for the Pittsburgh system, but now he was a referee. Commanding presence. Absolutely commanding. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[21]<![endif]>

The fans in the gym were really getting out of hand. At one time he made a call, and they're just screaming at him. He just takes the ball in one hand and goes to the center of the court and looks up. He says, "Any of you chicken-assed wanna come down here and make something of it, come on. "[ Laughter]

PJB: That shut 'em up?

GRW: That shut 'em up.

PJB: Mm-hmm.

GRW: Now, the story regarding Rich Leibner. Rich Leibner was fairly young to come. I think he came here at the age of 16. He did not play sports, but he was one of the cheerleaders, one of the few male cheerleaders that we had. He's down there with some of the women cheerleaders for Rochester.

I can recall that it was a close game, and I fouled out right at the end. <![if !supportFootnotes]>[22]<![endif]> I always had the—lived by the axiom that you had five fouls to give before you were ejected, and if you didn't give at least four, you weren't playing hard enough. [Laughter] It was that fine line between four and five, and I crossed it that night, so I'm on the bench.

All of a sudden there's another call or a scuffle or something, and I'm involved in a real riot, a real basketball riot. I get hit behind the back of the neck, and this was tough stuff. This was no fun. Now, later—and Leibner, of course, is about the only one there who's got a big R on his sweater. I think he got roughed up a little bit.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[23]<![endif]>

His story is that I was still in the game—I wasn't—and that I went for a lay-up, someone pushed me up against the wall, out of bounds, and I came back swinging, and that was what started the riot. Well, that—

PJB: It makes a great story.

GRW: It makes a great story.

PJB: Oh, it does. Yes.

GRW: Yes, Paul, the Hobart U of R—

PJB: Rivalry was alive and well.

GRW: - rivalry was alive and well. It certainly was. That was a—I had the experience of playing under Lou Alexander and then under Lyle Brown. As it turns out, I think Ted Zornow and I were maybe the only two left standing from the six of us who were really playing our freshman year. Lack of interest or academic problems.

PJB: You were a captain in your senior year. Is that right?

GRW: Ted and I were co-captains.

PJB: You were co-captains in your senior year.

GRW: We were.

PJB: Yeah.

GRW: We were.

PJB: Your athletic experience is really so rich and interesting, but you were a leader—your leadership experience is beyond the basketball court or sort of legion as well. You were a Theta Chi. And you were--were you president of the fraternity? I think you were.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[24]<![endif]>

GRW: I was. Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah.

PJB: You were able to exercise—just as you had at Webster in the high school, you kind of had an eclectic experience but at a fairly high level in everything that you chose to do, including your academic life, because you were a history major, but you graduated with honors.

GRW: Mm-hmm.

PJB: Talk a little bit about that.

GRW: Well, I was a pre-med, too. I was—

PJB: You were pre-med as well.

GRW: - I was undecided between law and medicine. My father, of course, had gone to Harvard Law School, came back, was in private practice, went on the bench, elected to surrogate judge shortly after he turned 40, so very young. And I’d really never knew him as a practicing lawyer. I knew him as a—

PJB: Judge.

GRW: - as a judge.

PJB: Mm-hmm.

GRW: That's right. One of the rules that he had and that most judges should have is you really should not fraternize that much with other lawyers who would come before you. You had to be fair. You had to be perceived as fair. That meant that my parents' social group included other judges but not really lawyers. Their closest friends were our family doctor and his wife. They would play bridge, I guess, almost every weekend together.

So I had—although there were no medical people in our family up until then, I always thought that that might be something that would interest me. So I was keeping my options open. I was a pre-med and a history major here. Spent two summers working at Genesee Hospital, first summer as an orderly, then the second summer as an operating room technician, which is essentially a scrub nurse.

There were two incidents that still are just vividly etched in my mind, one of a surgeon who operated on a teenage boy. Suspected that there was cancer. Did not have any of the diagnostic tools currently available in medicine. Brought him in, anesthetized him. The surgeon cut into his leg and saw it was just riddled with cancer. Not a thing he could do about it. Sewed him back up and with tears streaming down his face, the surgeon picked up the boy and carried him into the recovery room. Just heart-wrenching. And another one where a neurosurgeon operated on the brain of his best friend.

I thought to myself, "Witmer, you've got a choice to make. Why are you going to choose something that will just utterly rip your insides out and which is just very emotional?" Again, probably the right decision for all the wrong reasons, not realizing at that time that there's so much more to medicine than the operating field and the surgeon and many opportunities.

But I will say that when I came back and announced—I think this was probably at the end of my junior year—no, the beginning of my junior year—that I was not going to be a pre-med, my fellow pre-meds almost threw me a party because it was just very competitive. That was really a zero-sum game. When you were taking biology, the other pre-meds figured out they just can't let anyone else get a higher mark because that person might take away the position that he or she wants in medical school.

But by that time I had been admitted into the honors program, and that's really what I was thinking of when I said I made the right decision for all the wrong reasons, certainly in the academic part. Right decision in a lot of other areas, too, Paul, as you pointed out with certainly the fraternity, the interfraternity council.

The honors program back then was an extraordinary program.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[25]<![endif]> They had—in the full program, you only took two seminars a term, each one meeting once a week for three hours, oftentimes in the home of your professor, usually a full professor who would have the seminar. In each seminar, you were expected to prepare an original research paper, circulate it, and defend it every other week, so you are alternating your papers, and you are disciplining yourself as to time. No one tells you what to do other than those three hours that you were expected to be in the seminar.

PJB: You had the full three hours, did you, to present this paper? Is that the way went in the seminar?

GRW: No, because we would have—the seminar—again, depending on how many people were in the seminar, so half would present one week, another half the next week. You presented every other week—

PJB: Every other week. Yeah.

GRW: - in that particular seminar.

PJB: In that group. Mm-hmm.

GRW: The maximum number of eight students in a seminar, so you really formed a very close group. In one of my seminars, taught by Bill Diez, who was head of the political science department, there were only three of us.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[26]<![endif]> Very difficult to doze in that—

[Laughter]

GRW: - in that—that seminar. I later learned that the reason the number eight had been selected as a maximum number of students for the seminar was for that great didactic principle that at that time eight was a maximum number of copies one could make with ditto paper.

PJB: Oh!

[Laughter]

PJB: Before xerography. Right? [Laughter]

GRW: Before xerography, and also to my benefit, of course, because that meant we had this very small group that had the full attention of the professor and the other members of the group. When—in later years when I have described that process, some of my knowledgeable friends in academia said, "Well, that was a graduate program," and indeed it was. When I went off to law school at Harvard, where 60 percent of my classmates were from Harvard, Yale, or Princeton, I learned very quickly that I had received as good if not better an education than they had.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[27]<![endif]>

PJB: Can you recall other faculty members who had an impact on you intellectually in terms of the seminar or otherwise as a history honors major?

GRW: Let me start even before that. My freshman year, I had freshmen English from Bill Johnson—<![if !supportFootnotes]>[28]<![endif]>

PJB: Oh, yes.

GRW: - who was brand-new. Came up out of Alabama, and it was—

PJB: Still had that Southern accent the whole time he was here.

GRW: - Southern accent—

PJB: Mm-hmm.

GRW: - and taught—I didn't know what it was then, but he taught by use of the Socratic method. So, he'd just sit up on his desk and he'd start to fire questions at the—at the freshmen students. I soon realized what he was doing and, occasionally, I could see it was pretty obvious where his questions were leading and how he was pushing people to perhaps show them just how little foundation they had for a statement that they had made, and I would have a smile on my face or a smirk or whatever. Later, one time when we got to know each other in a different context, he would say, "I'd always—you would unsettle me because you just had that smile on your face as though you knew what I was doing—was up to."

PJB: He couldn't fool you, Bob. [Laughter] Right.

GRW: It was a good experience. That was—he was—I—I thought he was a terrific—

PJB: He was a man of imposing presence, as I recall. Yeah. He filled the room.

GRW: He did. More, I think, intellectually than physically.

PJB: Mm-hmm.

GRW: Someone who did it both, maybe--certainly physically--was Arthur May, who had taught my father.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[29]<![endif]>

PJB: Mm-hmm.

PJB: Did you study with Arthur May also?

GRW: I did. I did. I had history with Arthur May, who, of course, was just—the stories regarding him were legendary. He was an actor, as I think you need to be to some extent to be a good teacher. Some of his bits were—everyone knows that the last class, he'd say, "This is the beginning of June and the last of May."

[Laughter]

PJB: That's clever.

GRW: Then, of course, here we are, a bunch of adolescents—

PJB: Sure.

GRW: - and he would start talking about medieval—or mercantile, the history of Europe and of "the Fugger family" and "the Fuggers did this"— [laughter] —and, of course, the—the titters started up all over the room.

PJB: [Laughter] Of course.

GRW: He would—and he just gloried in that. He really was a showman. Later on, after graduation from law school and a little stint with the Army, I took my own little grand tour in Europe, and it was through Arthur that I—he put me in touch a friend of his in Vienna. Of course, that was his area of study, and he was very well known. I went and had tea with this man who had lost his leg in World War II but was an absolutely charming person. I spent probably two hours, again through Arthur May.

Bill Diez was another—Henry Benda<![if !supportFootnotes]>[30]<![endif]> may not be a name that many people recognize, but I had a seminar—one of the honors seminars, on China. Now, this is in—what?—'58, maybe '57, and China is in turmoil. Mao Tse-tung and the Kuomintang had been pushed off to Taiwan.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[31]<![endif]> We were looking at a lot of original material. That's really what we were—these papers were based primarily on primary sources, not—well, not primary sources in the sense that it's in Chinese—

PJB: Right, right.

GRW: - but we were digging. I thought that was one of the more rigorous seminars I had. One of the lessons I always—I kept with me—we would be discussing and talking about the series of five-year plans that the communists would put into place, but they'd come along actually within a shorter period than five years. He'd say, "Now, why do you think that they—we're having so many of these five-year plans?" and you realize, "Huh. ’cause the first one—the prior ones weren't working."

[Laughter]

GRW: That's why.

PJB: Right, that’s right.

GRW: They had to—had to get revised. Now, he left shortly after—that he was here for a short period of time, hired away by Yale. Then I learned later that he—I think he had died of a brain cancer or something like that. It was tragic because he was a very special teacher. I had John Christopher for Middle East.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[32]<![endif]>

Had Bill Dunkel<![if !supportFootnotes]>[33]<![endif]> for Shakespeare. History was my area, but not necessarily Shakespeare. I loved it, and enjoyed the seminar. We had—the process was at the end of the year, they would invite professors from other schools to come up to examine you. Dunkel invited a Shakespeare scholar from Princeton up, and this—well, it certainly happened with Dunkel's. I'm trying to recall. It may've been the only seminar, but anyway, I certainly recall this incident.

Here we are in probably May. Lovely, warm spring day. I put on a light seersucker jacket or whatever and go off for my examination with this professor and Dunkel. I am just put through the paces. This was not an easy discussion. This is not just a fun time over tea. They really pressed and I tried to defend myself, after which Dunkel said, "Well, Mr. Witmer, I'm not sure that I agreed with that many of your answers, but you certainly defended them vigorously."

[Laughter]

PJB: The confidence was there.

GRW: Well—

PJB: That matters a lot, it seems to me.

GRW: Well, although—when I walked out, I'm sure—I think I had sweat stains down to my elbows with this jacket that I had.

PJB: Clearly, you made an impact as an undergraduate.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[34]<![endif]> We've talked about your athletic career and leadership and leadership with Theta Chi, but you also were a Mendicant as a junior.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[35]<![endif]> You were a Keidaeans.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[36]<![endif]> Both honor societies.

GRW: Yeah.

PJB: And so, in the class of '59, you have to be, on the basis of the evidence, it's clear that Bob Witmer is someone who has really taken advantage of what the institution has to offer, and the institution has recognized and acknowledged that. Is that—that's my read on it anyway.

GRW: Well, yes. In—

PJB: And you were Phi Beta Kappa.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[37]<![endif]>

GRW: Yes. Yep. Certainly, I was provided with these opportunities that I took advantage of, but the opportunities were there. The school population was small enough that I could do several things, although I clearly focused more in college than I did in high school, but that was understandable. I needed to do that. For example, I did not even go out for football. We had an outstanding football team. It was undefeated.

PJB: Undefeated. That's right.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[38]<![endif]>

GRW: I just figured I wanted to focus on my studies and I would play basketball, and I had many of my friends—well, my father had been a Theta Chi. I liked the men that I met there and decided to pledge Theta Chi and pledged in the same class with a then sophomore by the name of Ed Hajim.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[39]<![endif]> Ed and I were pledges.

PJB: Now, did you pledge in your freshman year?

GRW: Yes.

PJB: Okay. You were a Theta Chi for your four years as an undergraduate?

GRW: Yes. That's right.

PJB: Did you live in a house the entire time?

GRW: No, no. No. I lived in Hoeing with a Webster High School classmate, Paul Kraska,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[40]<![endif]> my first year; still in Hoeing my sophomore year with Gary Haynes,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[41]<![endif]> this other basketball player, in Gilbert my junior year because my younger brother, John—he's 15 months younger—came here, also played basketball. Something that none of us knew at the time, but John had some slight dyslexia, but had a wonderful time—

[Laughter]

GRW: - and with another friend of his from Webster—they roomed together their freshman year—almost flunked out. I decided, "Look. You and I are gonna room together your sophomore year and my junior year." That's what we did in Gilbert.

John, who was a very good basketball player, played freshmen ball, but then just really could not, because of his academics, play his sophomore and junior year, was invited by Lyle Brown to come back and play as a senior on the basketball team.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[42]<![endif]> That's something that coaches never do. They want to invest in a player who's got a few more years, but John was that good, that Lyle wanted him to come back, and John had gotten his academic career on line and eventually went off to Cornell School of Veterinary Medicine and had a wonderful career as an equine veterinary.

Then my senior year, I lived in the house with Jerry Winter,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[43]<![endif]> who was a tackle on the football team and chemistry major. We shared a room. Theta Chi is small even by U of R fraternity standards, so we would each have our own study rooms but had one large dormitory on the third floor. Everyone slept up on the third floor so the study rooms were fairly compact, let's say. That's what I shared with Jerry. We had a—Theta Chi was a very good group of young men.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[44]<![endif]> trustees. Roy Whitney<![if !supportFootnotes]>[45]<![endif]> was a couple of years ahead of us. Bill Brown<![if !supportFootnotes]>[46]<![endif]> was behind us. Ed Hajim and I were there. Ed Gibson, our first astronaut—<![if !supportFootnotes]>[47]<![endif]>

PJB: Astronaut.

GRW: - was in our class. I, again, only half-jokingly, said that it's a good thing that I went—that I joined Theta Chi and not—there were a couple of the fraternities that really had a higher percentage of athletes. Theta Delt was one, and that's where most of my friends went that I knew my freshman year.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[48]<![endif]> I used to joke with them, "It's a good thing I didn't come with you guys ’cause I never would've made Phi Beta Kappa."

[Laughter]

PJB: That could very well be true.

GRW: I know! [Laughter]

PJB: Well, you know, your brother, John, came, and really starting with the judge, a Witmer legacy has been a—that was the start of a legacy because not only did John come, but Tom came as well.

GRW: That's true.

PJB: Whatever—your brother, Tom—whatever you foreswore in terms of a medical career, John and Tom made up for it, because Tom is—John is a veterinarian and Tom is a physician. Right?

GRW: That's right. That's right. No. There were—many—not just a veterinarian. John really was—at the—took care of horses at the racetracks. There were several years when he was essentially the go-to vet down at Meadowlands. There were many years that if something ailed me, I thought very long and hard as to which brother I would go to for advice because if I pulled up lame, running or something like that, it more than likely it would be my brother, John, the vet—

PJB: John. [Laughter]

GRW: - that I would—

[Laughter]

GRW: - go to.

PJB: Sticking for a moment just with the legacy, you had a sister-in-law who also is an alum, and then there's Heidi, your daughter, who—I was her dean of students, and so I knew Heidi well. She came. Who am I—am I leaving anybody out? Because there are—

GRW: Oh! [Sigh]

PJB: - there is—the Witmer legacy is very, very much a part of our history.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[49]<![endif]>

GRW: We actually—two—well, a former sister-in-law. My brother John's first wife was a graduate here. His two children, Rob and Puck, both graduated here. Tom's older son, John, graduated in English from here. Our daughter, Wendy—we're not sure whether we're gonna claim her. We always claim her, but she got a certificate from the Simon School. [Laughter]

PJB: That counts.

GRW: That counts.

PJB: That counts. Sure.

GRW: Our son, Rob, was Class of 2000 in the medical school here, where he met and married a classmate who was one of our REMS<![if !supportFootnotes]>[50]<![endif]> scholars. She spent eight years here. They are now in Philadelphia.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[51]<![endif]> I think that covers pretty much that generation, and we're working on the next generation. [Laughter]

PJB: I was gonna say there are grandchildren who coming along—

GRW: Sure.

PJB: - and who knows?

GRW: Who knows?

PJB: They may wear the yellow and—the gold and the blue as well.

GRW: That's it.

PJB: When you came as a freshman in 1955--that was a watershed year here on the River campus because life changed dramatically with the removal of the College for Women from the Prince Street Campus to the River Campus. Maybe you could talk a little bit about what life was like, what you found here. What was your experience with this really—my read on it is a kind of monumental change?

GRW: I'm sure it was, but, again, not for me in the sense that I had not—

PJB: Been here before.

GRW: - been here before.

PJB: Sure.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[52]<![endif]>

GRW: We knew that we all part of a brave new world, if you will.

PJB: Right.

GRW: I do recall that we started the school year late. Didn't start until, I think, October. There had been a steel strike and a shortage of steel that had delayed the completion of Susan B. Anthony.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[53]<![endif]>

PJB: The Habein Hilton.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[54]<![endif]>

GRW: The Habein Hilton. That's right. That's right. Consequently, they just delayed the opening of school. In terms of—well, the rules were different. The vital rules. I can still recall there were a couple of men who were caught in the Habein Hilton after curfew hours, and they were gone.

PJB: Really?

GRW: They were gone. That's right. That's right. This is no nonsense. No—no co-ed floors back then, Paul.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[55]<![endif]>

[Laughter]

PJB: Yes. The co-ed floors had to wait until the towers<![if !supportFootnotes]>[56]<![endif]> were built, of course.

GRW: Yeah.

PJB: It was a pretty different time when you were an undergraduate and women were introduced here.

GRW: Yeah. No. It was.

PJB: Yeah.

GRW: Although I would have—I was not what I would call a social butterfly. I would have dates for large weekends at the fraternity, but my time was spend studying or playing basketball or doing—

PJB: Sure.

GRW: - keeping my—

PJB: Sure.

GRW: Oh, one thing that I should probably mention. Because I had not gone really far away to school, I was intent on making this seem as though I really had, so the first time I went home to Webster, which is—you're talking 13, 14 miles—

PJB: Yeah.

GRW: - was Thanksgiving.

PJB: Really?

GRW: Second time was Christmas.

PJB: Oh.

GRW: At that time, it was a long-distance phone call between Webster and the U of R.

PJB: Sure.

GRW: I would call home once a week, usually by Sunday night, and talk to my folks. I just thought I needed to—this was the time to establish some separation and independence, and they certainly understood. That worked out just fine, but they were able to come up. They would see me play basketball and--

PJB: Well, you know, students today who are local students still create that kind of separation, so they tell me. The one big difference, of course, is that instead of having to go to the telephone in the hall of the residence hall and have the operator connect you and let your folks know that it's a collect call coming from their son—

GRW: [Laughter]

PJB: - they now have their iPhones.

GRW: You're right.

GRW: It's a really different world, isn't it?

GRW: Completely. Completely different.

PJB: You graduated then, and how much time was there between graduating in '59 and your matriculating at Harvard Law? Did you go immediately?

GRW: I went immediately. Yes. I started at Harvard Law in '59 and graduated in '62 there, went into the Army reserves, which meant six months at Fort Dix, and then took my little European grand tour for six weeks, which was just on my own. Got a Eurail pass and went around.

By that time I had a job lined up with the Nixon Hargrave firm. In fact, it's interesting. When most of my classmates at Harvard were interviewing for jobs in New York or Chicago, L.A., San Francisco, and the good old Southern boys in Atlanta, where they really rode a wave of development—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - I looked nowhere other than back here in Rochester. At that time—I think I'm right; the numbers may be a little off, but I don't think so—there were 13 of the companies headquartered in Rochester that were listed on the New York Stock Exchange; and that meant that when those companies had litigation—difficult litigation--it didn't go to a headquarters in New York or Chicago. It stayed right in Rochester. The Nixon firm represented almost all of those companies.

It was a wonderful opportunity and experience for me to become a part of that firm and eventually part of the leadership as we expanded and changed along with the changing legal landscape over the years and at a time when the firm was good enough and I'm not sure that they, I'd say, encouraged, but they allowed me to do things other than the practice of law. So I became active politically, and I became active with my University.

I started, I think, probably with Al Brewer,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[57]<![endif]> who put together the athletic department would have in the spring one or two Saturday luncheons to which they would invite student athletes that they were very interested in and their parents, but wanted to have recent alumni or alumni talk to these prospective students. Al Brewer ran that program, and I was asked shortly after I came back to town if I'd like to participate in that, and I did. That, together with some encouragement from John Braund<![if !supportFootnotes]>[58]<![endif]> and Roger Lathan,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[59]<![endif]> got me going in with the alumni activities.

One of my favorite stories about these athletic luncheons is that I recall talking to I think a linebacker out of the Pennsylvania coal hills. The football coach was just salivating over this kid. We really wanted him. Part of the process was you would have lunch, but then you would go with just the student, not his parents, into a room and just talk. At one point in the conversation, I asked, "How are your marks? I certainly know how—what sort of football player you are and your talents in that regard." He said, "Oh! I'm fine. I got—" I said, "What's your SAT score?" He said, "700," which—I thought that was pretty darn good. Then I said, "Which one was 700?" Turns out that was the combined—

[Laughter]

GRW: - for both of them. I just immediately said, "Look. There are some schools where you will thrive and do well, and I just think that this is not one of them. You really should start to look at some other schools where you'll be able to play football still and yet also be competitive academically."

PJB: No doubt you did that student a great favor with that piece of advice—

GRW: I hope so.

PJB: - and the coach as well. [Laughter]

GRW: Yes. That's true.

PJB: Because the coach would have inherited—

GRW: Oh.

PJB: - whatever problems might have come along. Who knows? Right? Yeah.

GRW: True.

PJB: Your early involvement—and it makes all the sense in the world, it seems to me—your early involvement upon your return and the start of your professional life was in an environment that you loved very much, namely the athletic environment—

GRW: Yeah. Mm-hmm.

PJB: - and assisting with the recruitment of your successors, as it were. It's interesting. You're rare in a way because of all of our presidents, you have been a part of the University through de Kiewiet,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[60]<![endif]> through Wallis,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[61]<![endif]> through Sproull,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[62]<![endif]> through O'Brien,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[63]<![endif]> through Jackson,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[64]<![endif]> and now through Joel,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[65]<![endif]> so six of our ten presidents have been a part of your life, and first as a very successful student, as a successful professional person in a variety of ways, and then as, in my view, and I've known you a long time, an extraordinary leader in the University.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[66]<![endif]>

You have seen this place through more than a third of its history and have some—and you've lived it. You have the lived experience of the University. I'd really be interested, and I think people seeing this would be interested, in your thoughtful and wise observations about the University of Rochester, this great institution, over a long period of time, where we've come from in your experience, the progress that we have made. And having been a trustee since 1979, ’cause that's, I believe, when you were elected—

GRW: Mm-hmm.

PJB: - having been the chair of the board of trustees from 2003 to 2008, having been responsible for the election of—leading the process that led to the election of a president—you have a lived experience that very, very few people have, from an 18-year-old freshman to today.

GRW: Yeah.

PJB: Your perspective on the University over all that period of time and as rich an experience as it has been is golden. If you would just hold forth a little bit about that.

GRW: I think the first thing to keep in mind is that the perspective changes, of course. The perspective of an 18-year-old coming on campus is far different than the perspective of someone who's been on the board for 35 years. Starting with President de Kiewiet, I'm sure I met him. I'm sure I saw him, but don't hold me to that. [Laughter] Again, he was not a presence—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - on campus, or at least one of which I was aware.

PJB: I think there's a general—your observation coincides with what some of the literature from what others have said.

GRW: Yeah.

PJB: He was so busy with the move that and his particular style of leadership was such that students weren't particularly aware of him, I think.

GRW: I think that's right. Then when I came back to town, by that time I think Joe Wilson<![if !supportFootnotes]>[67]<![endif]> had hired Allen Wallis, and Allen was president. That's probably when we—undoubtedly when we started to see a sea change in this University. Now, this University is—as you know very well, Paul—certainly, with the medical school—it has a wonderful reputation, and graduate programs in that sense, but in terms of graduate programs, when I was an undergraduate, the business school was just starting.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[68]<![endif]>

Some of the departments, physics and science departments and history—they were strong departments, but I didn't have the sense, and perhaps it was my perspective as an undergraduate—didn't have the sense that this was a particular powerhouse in terms of graduate programs. We had some graduate students around, but I didn't have that much connection with them. I think it was under Allen Wallis where the—coming from his background at Chicago and with the backing of Joe Wilson, that we really started to focus on making this what I would term a "full research University,"<![if !supportFootnotes]>[69]<![endif]> although we've been a member of the AAU for a good long time.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[70]<![endif]>

PJB: Right.

GRW: Allen's style, his—I think his personality was somewhat aloof, but I recall he worked very hard and successfully at recruiting outstanding faculty members. One of his accomplishments was the faculty club to attract—he thought that a world-class faculty deserved a world-class faculty club, and he did it.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[71]<![endif]> Now, here I am as a young bachelor lawyer in town, asked to teach a business law course here primarily to insurance agents for their certification, in my first or second year in practice, which was a good experience. It was tough. I had to put together the whole curriculum and everything else ’cause it wasn't—no one just handed me material to give, but that enabled me to be designated as an instructor.

Now, the importance of that is that this high-falutin' faculty club, which had by far the best chef in town, had a graduated fee scale for faculty. Instructors were $15 a year or something like that. It was just—it was ridiculous ’cause I was a—particularly for a bachelor at the largest law firm in town. I could have afforded more than that.

They would have, oh, happy hours and so forth, so I would come out maybe on a Friday afternoon and just meet some of the younger faculty who would be there. But they had a monthly gourmet dinner, and faculty would almost kill to be on that invitation list. It was so popular that you could—they maybe had eight of those a year, and if you signed up, with luck you'd get to go to two, maybe only one. This was a full multi-course dinner, different wine with each course, after-dinner liqueurs. It was—it was a very fancy dinner, all for, as I recall, $25.

I made friends with the manager of the club and let it be known to him that I was always available if there happened to be a last-minute vacancy. Here I was as a full member of the faculty club—after all, I was an instructor— [laughter] —and went to several of these splendid, splendid dinners. I can thank Allen Wallis for that. That was a wonderful, wonderful experience. I had—

PJB: That was up on the fourth floor in Douglas, was it?

GRW: Yes.

PJB: Yes.

GRW: Yes. Absolutely.

PJB: Where meals were served and there were—you actually had waiter service.

GRW: Oh!

PJB: I remember. Yes. Waiter service.

GRW: Indeed. In fact, my niece, Catherine Puck Witmer, when she was here as an undergraduate, waited table at the faculty club.

PJB: My sister, Lettie<![if !supportFootnotes]>[72]<![endif]> when she was an undergraduate, she waited tables in the faculty club as well. [Laughter]

GRW: Yep. Yep. No, no. No, this was a—and Rochester at that time was not known for its restaurants.

PJB: Right. Right.

GRW: You had some country clubs or an eating club, but this was not a town where people went out to eat in restaurants, and so the faculty club was one of the preeminent restaurants—

PJB: It really filled a need, didn't it?

GRW: It did.

PJB: Yes. I remember.

GRW: It did. Then, of course, Allen—in terms of succession, Allen certainly did it differently and well in the sense that he brought Bob Sproull here, who had been provost—

PJB: At Cornell.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[73]<![endif]>

GRW: - at Cornell, to groom him as Allen's successor. As you and I both know, that's not the usual way that it works in academia. I had much more contact with Bob Sproull than with Allen. My involvement—the involvement was Allen was—I was also beginning to be quite active in the formal alumni organization of the University. Nothing, quite frankly, that Allen particularly cared about, and I don't think Bob did either.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[74]<![endif]> It was a different style.

PJB: Right.

GRW: I would—those who were active in the alumni organization and when I later went on the board of trustees, it—could see the remnants of that carried forward. It was much more, though, a show-and-tell. Bring—if they're interested, we're interested in them, but we'll show them what we're doing and tell them what we're doing, then go home. Very little interaction, and that was—heavens forbid that the alumni or trustees try to involve themselves in some of the real decisions that—to be made. Those decisions are gonna be made by the president and the chairman of the board, and that was—thank you very much. [Laughter]

PJB: How was your read on—I can remember well that when Allen acceded to this new position that we called the Chancellor, and Bob took over—Bob had been president and chief operating officer, essentially a provostial appointment. Then in I think about 1970 or so, Sproull acceded to president and CEO, and Allen was the Chancellor.

GRW: Yes.

PJB: I think I've got that about right.

GRW: Yes.

PJB: As I a student—I was a graduate student back then, and as a graduate student, I was trying to understand the nature of the leadership at that time. So maybe you can—maybe you have a perspective about what the goal here was.

GRW: I really don't have a perspective as to what they were thinking or their goal. I can surmise, but it would be more speculation than anything else. I think both strong-willed men, both very able, and somewhat—and different styles, clearly. Both very intelligent. Bob, I always thought was usually the smartest person in the room. The problem was he—from my perspective, he needed to demonstrate that he was the smartest person in the room, and he could be somewhat overbearing at—at times.

He was a—one of my—unquestionably the relationship that I—I was closest with Bob Sproull on was really the only major legal matter that I really handled for the University. I had made it—not a point of principle. It's just a operating assumption that I would not do that much legal work for the University that I wanted to keep those two separate and was more and more active with the alumni organizations. It turns out that the University was involved—the fraternities were placed on the tax rolls by the city. This was my area of expertise, and so I represented the University in litigation that was really quite groundbreaking eventually.

PJB: As I recall, we took over ownership of the—

GRW: We always—

PJB: Was that when we took over ownership of the houses?

GRW: We always had ownership. This was the distinction that really carried the day. In the '30s when the River Campus was formed, the arrangement was made with the individual fraternities that they could build their houses and operate them on University land, but the land itself was never conveyed—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - to the fraternities, nor was there any separate document or understanding as to the ownership of those houses.

PJB: Oh.

GRW: One of the critical points in this litigation was who owned the property and then was it used—the law says "exclusively," but the courts have construed exclusively quite liberally for educational purposes. One of my expert witness at the trial was my classmate Larry Palvino,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[75]<![endif]> who was the captain of the football team, one of the best natural leaders I have ever met in my life and who unfortunately left us far too early. Larry had then gone to law school, was back in town, practicing real estate law. I put Larry on the stand to testify that if, for example, Paul Burgett owned some property and lets Bob Witmer build on that property but there's no other agreement, guess who owns what Bob Witmer built. Paul Burgett, because it's on Paul Burgett's—

PJB: Land.

GRW: Property. Land.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[76]<![endif]>

PJB: Mm-hmm.

GRW: The University owned the property. Then the issue was whether it was used exclusively for educational purposes, and I retained Alexander Astin—<![if !supportFootnotes]>[77]<![endif]>

PJB: Oh, yeah.

GRW: - from the University—UCLA, who had—

PJB: Yep. Educational expert. Yeah.

GRW: - made longitudinal studies of the advantages—educational advantages of small-group living. Of course, my fraternities morphed in my briefs from fraternities to small-group living facilities.

[Laughter]

GRW: We tried that before Judge James Boomer,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[78]<![endif]> who was a very good judge, Supreme Court judge, and he had a bad day because he decided against us on every—on all nine fraternities.

PJB: Oh, really?

GRW: I took it up to the intermediate Appellate Court, the appellate division, and persuaded them that six of the nine should be tax-exempt, but that there were three others where there was—as I recall, I think the—we had separate agreements with the alumni for those three, so—

PJB: Do you remember which they were.

GRW: [Sigh] I almost think it was Alpha Delt, Theta Chi, and maybe Psi U, but I'm not sure. Those were the—it was easier to get up to the highest court in the state back then, but I probably could have even on this case today. We went up to Albany to the Court of Appeals, where I had that decision modified so that all nine were declared to be tax-exempt, but what started me on this story is that I had Larry Palvino, I had Sandy Astin, and my other expert—if not expert but key witness--was one Robert Sproull.

Now, I was terrified—not really of Bob—terrified that he would start—would need to prove to the judge just how much he knew and how smart he was— [laughter] —and that could be disastrous. Here I am, a fairly young cub at that time, telling the president of the University, who, by the way, had testified many times before congressional committees and so forth.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[79]<![endif]> This was—Bob Sproull was very able, and he knew how to and in what way to present himself. We would review his testimony when I was preparing him for the trial, and he went on the stand, and, of course, he was perfect. He was just—everyone bowed and scraped, and he said exactly what he needed to say, and he was off the stand.

PJB: When did this happen? When was this?

GRW: Late '70s, I think.

PJB: Late '70s. So in the late '70s, you were able to have all nine houses declared tax-exempt, and all nine houses were owned by the University of Rochester.

GRW: Right.

PJB: Okay.

GRW: That in an era, and still is, where you can search high and low. You will not find very many, if any, other universities or colleges whose fraternities are tax-exempt. This—this was highly unusual, but it was highly unusual because we were able to focus on this issue of title and control.

PJB: Interesting. Well then, when we renovated those houses, was there any—were there any changes in the relationships of the fraternities to the University in terms of the funding of the renovations of those houses?

GRW: Yes. That, I think, is primarily—that was under Joel, and the University has made a commitment, much more of a commitment, financial and programmatic, to the fraternities than before.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[80]<![endif]> They are more closely intertwined with the educational program of the University than they have ever been before, from my perspective.

PJB: Much more closely aligned with Residential Life, and you had a lot to do with that because you chaired that task force that came up with the Expectations of Excellence and, as I recall—<![if !supportFootnotes]>[81]<![endif]>

GRW: Well, we—I worked again, I think, with Larry Palvino. This was back—

PJB: Back a ways.

GRW: - back a ways when we first started with that.

PJB: Right. Right.

GRW: The task force that I think you have in mind was—Mike Jones<![if !supportFootnotes]>[82]<![endif]> was the chair of that.

PJB: Yeah. Mike Jones was part of that. Yeah.

GRW: I was on that—

PJB: Okay.

GRW: - and participated in that, but I think Mike chaired that, too.

PJB: Okay.

GRW: That led to where we are now.

PJB: Once Dennis O'Brien came, we saw a sort of sharp departure in the style of leadership—didn't we?—from the Wallis-Sproull model to the O'Brien model.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[83]<![endif]> My sense is that there was an attempt to throw open the doors and the windows of the place and to focus on undergraduate education. Is that a fair assessment?

GRW: Yes. To throw open the doors in other ways, too. To the community.

PJB: To the community. Right.

GRW: For example, I can recall I was able to facilitate--I think--the first meeting between Dennis and Bill Johnson, who at that time was at the Urban League.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[84]<![endif]>

PJB: Right.

GRW: It was under Dennis that we put the bridge--pedestrian bridge across the Genesee, not without some controversy.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[85]<![endif]>

PJB: Not without some controversy. [Laughter]

GRW: That's right.

PJB: Yeah.

GRW: That's right.

PJB: I remember those days.

GRW: Dennis' tour was a difficult one at times.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[86]<![endif]> He did not have, I think, the support of the faculty at times that would've—that he needed, and we seemed to have lost some of the momentum, certainly within the College, but I think also in the Medical School, too. I'm not sure Dennis gave the attention to the medical school and its problems that was necessary at that time. That was—and then—this would have been around '94, something like that—we started a search for Dennis's successor, and I was, of course, on the board by that time, and you were actively involved in that, Paul.

PJB: I was. Yes.

GRW: I can recall that that was—Dick Aslin<![if !supportFootnotes]>[87]<![endif]> and I were the first ones—well, the process that under Bob Goergen<![if !supportFootnotes]>[88]<![endif]> —and I'm sure you would and others—put together—I thought worked very well. We had our trustees search committee, and then we had a—

PJB: The faculty advisors.

GRW: - very strong faculty advisory committee.

PJB: That Chuck Phelps chaired.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[89]<![endif]>

GRW: Chuck Phelps headed that.

PJB: Right.

GRW: That's right. The two worked together as a committee of the whole, essentially. Legally, at the end the trustees voted—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - but it was a vote that was informed by the advisory committee. That was a process that I then followed ten years later when we put together the mechanism for going out and searching for Tom Jackson's successor, but getting back in a moment to Tom Jackson, who, as you and I both know, just extraordinary person and accomplishments here. Here was someone who had gone to Williams, Yale Law School, clerked for Judge Frankel<![if !supportFootnotes]>[90]<![endif]> in the Southern District, but Frankel is a District Court federal judge was really a feeder for the U. S. Supreme Court, and Tom Jackson ends up clerking—<![if !supportFootnotes]>[91]<![endif]>

PJB: For Rehnquist.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[92]<![endif]>

GRW: - for Rehnquist—

PJB: Yeah.

GRW: - Chief Judge of the Supreme Court, then goes on to be a tenured professor at Stanford, at Harvard, dean of the law school at Virginia. Virginia loses its provost to a disease, I think, suddenly, and the other deans suggest, "Well, why don't we have Tom Jackson be provost of the University of Virginia?" Other deans never do that.

[Laughter]

GRW: It just—it doesn't happen, but it happened with Tom. Here we are, interviewing this provost of the University of Virginia, who is a lawyer. He doesn't have a Ph.D., and some of the faculty on the advisory committee are a little nervous about this until Chuck Phelps, who, of course, was head of the advisory committee, held appointments on both sides of Elmwood Avenue, was highly regarded by everyone academically—

PJB: That’s right.

GRW: - said—and I still recall him saying it, as I'm sure you do—"This guy is super smart." Speaking of Tom—

PJB: That's a Phelpsian term, isn't it? [Laughter]

GRW: - Tom Jackson. We never heard anything more about the fact that—at least, "He's only a lawyer."

[Laughter]

GRW: "He's not a Ph.D." I do recall in the midst of that search process, ’cause by that time I was heavily involved even within the trustees committee with that, Tom had asked me if I might talk to his wife, Bonnie,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[93]<![endif]> about moving to Rochester. Bonnie was not—I mean here they were. Charlottesville. Not a bad place to live.

PJB: Right.

GRW: They've got two young sons, probably—I don't know—11 and 13.

PJB: Something like that.

GRW: Something like that at that time.

PJB: Yeah.

GRW: At that time. This is a nice life in Charlottesville. We wanna move up to Rochester? What about that? We set up a time for me to call. As I recall, it was early evening, and I just thought that, "I'll stay in the office where things are quiet and I won't be interrupted, and I can talk to Bonnie. "I called, and we talked for, oh, a good hour. By that time—now, our four children were still in high school but had come through and were doing well, and I could give her my own personal experience in both growing up here, coming back to town, my experience as a parent. It was—Tom credits me with—I guess enough to persuade Bonnie that she should take a hard look. And fortunately, they did and decided to come here.

As we now know, even after retiring as president, and us not having a law school—and I know that when he announced his retirement, he had several major law schools offering him the deanships that were available—turned them all down, took appointments here on the faculty, and they decided they wanted to live here in the Rochester area and has done so and done so happily. That has—that has worked out.

Of course, Tom's style, again, was different. Dennis was a wonderfully engaging and gregarious person and a very good community representative for the University. Tom was and is much more of an introvert. He reached out to Chuck Phelps and appointed him provost, and the two of them turned their attentions to some serious issues that needed to be addressed for the University, and they did so successfully, not without controversy, here.

This was—but I give Tom, and Chuck with him, full credit for stabilizing this institution, and for focusing on the excellence that has been and must be our hallmark, and creating the foundation that made us sufficiently attractive to persuade Joel to come here as president. Joel has been able to build on that foundation in just astonishing ways that are exciting to everyone and to—me included. Certainly, as you said, I've seen this institution and been closely involved since age 18. I've never been more proud and more excited about the movement and the future of our University than I am today.

PJB: In talking about Tom Jackson, I've often thought of him as like an exquisite Swiss watchmaker who sits at his desk with the back of the watch off, with his eyepiece in, working the mechanisms—in our case, the College and the Medical Center—all in preparation of ensuring that the foundation is strong so that our tenth president coming along in Joel Seligman is able to capitalize—as you’ve just said, capitalize on this newfound strength and catapult us in the course of the last almost 11 years now into a place we—25 years ago we couldn't have imagined. Is that fair?

GRW: I think you've stated it very well, Paul. Yeah. He's—I give Tom a great deal of credit. He—when I became Chair of the Board, I realized that we would be conducting a presidential search at some time during my tour. That just seemed fairly evident. Tom pulled the trigger on me about a year earlier than I thought he would and that I thought was right, although on reflection, he was absolutely right. This was the time for him to push me and you and others a little faster than I thought we were going to do. Those were—Tom had realized the—I'm not sure I'd call it malaise, but that the medical school, the Medical Center, had not kept pace with our peers.

PJB: We had actually lost status—

GRW: We had lost some—

PJB: - in our NIH funding, hadn't we?

GRW: Yes. Right. Yes, yes.

PJB: Particularly our NIH funding.

GRW: And in the standings of the—

PJB: From 28 ^th to 14 ^th in a short period of time—

GRW: Yeah. Yeah.

PJB: - or from 14 ^th to 28 ^th .

GRW: Fourteenth to twenty-eighth. Right. Tom realized that, as did Chuck, I'm sure. And needed to hire a change agent, and we go the change agent extraordinaire.

PJB: We did. Yes, we did.

GRW: We got Jay Stein,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[94]<![endif]> and I will admit I was not in favor of hiring Jay Stein. It just—I realized we needed a change agent, but I wasn't sure—my approach was probably a more collegial approach than was needed at that time—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - but Tom recognized that, I think—

PJB: Yeah.

GRW: - and so made—to my mind, Jay was just the right hire to make. It was tough, and there were—a lot of pottery was—

PJB: Broken.

GRW: - broken, both internally and externally.

PJB: Yes.

GRW: But we needed that, and I give Jay Stein full credit for doing for us exactly what we had asked him to do. Now, there was a time—there came a time when Jay, who almost by definition had a large ego and I think saw that here the Medical Center was contributing about 70 to 75 percent of the revenue of the revenue of the University—and we had, under Bob Goergen's leadership, looked very hard at whether we should split the medical school or the clinical operations from the University because we had seen that the University of Pennsylvania was almost taken down by their problems—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - and that there were other medical centers that had suffered serious financial risks because of the clinical operations. I—and Bob Goergen, being superb business man that he is, saw that and thought, "We don't wanna risk the College because of what might happen clinically." I must say that as we looked at that closer and closer, I became firmly convinced there was no good way to split off our clinical operations and maintain our excellence in the medical field. The clinical and the research and the education were so intricately interwoven, and every--almost every--place that had separated them out, you would have a clash of egos. You would have someone in charge of the clinical operations and then someone in charge of the medical school and, almost inevitably, they would be at loggerheads.

My conclusion was that for better or for worse, we're in this. This is what we are, and we just oughta make the best of it, as—as I—I think we have. We then—we the board decided, "No, we're not going to separate these entities." I think that was probably a disappointment to Jay.

PJB: Yes.

GRW: And there were—Jay's style was to be, I think, somewhat secretive as well, and Tom began to get some reports that Jay was undermining the presidency. I recall the night before I became Chair of the Board, Tom invited Bob Goergen and me to have dinner with him at the Genesee Valley Club, laid this all out with his recommendation that we relieve Jay. We agreed. Also agreed that it needed to be done quickly. Jay was just too divisive of a force to—if this was going to—what's the Macbeth line? "If this ’twere done, ‘twere best done quickly."

Melissa Mead: "done quickly."

GRW: That night, Tom put together a letter to Jay. We called a meeting, I guess the next morning, of the compensation and compliance committee to get approval. Did not even have time to go to the full executive committee. Brought Jay in. Tom gave him the letter, and Jay looked at it and, without a word, just took it and left. This created—this was a real shock to some members of the board because during this period of time, we had—whereas before very few members of the board were from the medical community—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - but by that time, we had put on the board not just—not doctors but people who were committed to the Medical Center and who really wanted—and felt very strongly about this. All of a sudden, their leader had been dismissed, and they didn't know about it. Legitimately, this was—and created a serious problem with the board.

We got through that day-and-a-half, and at the conclusion of the board meeting—this is in May, so it'd be a Friday noon—Tom Jackson and Chuck Phelps and I then met, sort of a post-op lunch in Tom's office. This is my now first day as Chairman of the Board. I still recall walking out from that luncheon meeting. I was tossing around in my mind, "How am I gonna deal with the board? With whom should I deal? How should I deal with them?" All of these things. A rain was falling. It was a damp, dismal May day, and the coup de grâce was that I had parked across the street on Wilson Boulevard at a city parking meter, and there on my car was a parking ticket.

[Laughter]

GRW: A perfect ending.

[Laughter]

GRW: Things couldn't get worse, and they didn't, and so we—we survived that. That was a difficult transition period. Chuck Phelps, of course, took—

PJB: Stepped in. Yeah.

GRW: - stepped in, and then we brought—oh, dear—

PJB: Mac Evarts.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[95]<![endif]>

GRW: Mac. Mac came in.

PJB: Mm-hmm.

GRW: Then Joel decided, appropriately, to appoint Brad as CEO.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[96]<![endif]> And so I—but Joel, when he came, knowing full well that he really had no experience with a medical complex, did a couple of things. One, he brought Bill Peck <![if !supportFootnotes]>[97]<![endif]> on the board. Bill, who's this extraordinary resource from Wash U, from which Joel came.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[98]<![endif]> Then Joel, on his listening tour, really paid attention at the Medical Center and met with all of the division chiefs and so forth, so threw himself into the issues involving the Medical Center I think even more than Tom Jackson had and realized the importance of that to the overall University and the importance—something that I, for years in various ways, have tried to encourage—collaboration among the various units of the University on both sides of Elmwood.

For example, I went on the Board of the Eastman Dental Center in '76, three years before I came on the University Board. And that center, which is one of the centers that George Eastman established worldwide—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - has—eventually, we entered into a working agreement with the University at—when I first went on, the Dental Center was primarily clinical and in clinical research, and the basic research was—Bowen is his last name<![if !supportFootnotes]>[99]<![endif]> —anyway, terrific part of our medical school. The dental research division was an absolute star, getting all sorts of monies, and they hated each other. It was just—it was a result of personality clashes that began decades before, and it was poisonous atmosphere.

Working hard with several others on the Eastman Dental Center Board, and the fact that the Dental Center had a lot of Kodak stock and then needed to have some financial assistance and so really needed to look to the University. We initially leased the land on Elmwood Avenue from the University to build a new Dental Center, but then initiated a working arrangement, working agreement, with the University that eventually resulted in a merger.

GRW: So that the Dental Center is now part of the Medical Center. We've gone through a few executive directors at the Dental Center, each one burdened with some historical baggage, so that now we have a director, Eli Eliav,<![if !supportFootnotes]>[100]<![endif]> who came to us from outside, from Rutgers, who I am—I must say I'm very excited with what he is doing. Mark Taubman<![if !supportFootnotes]>[101]<![endif]> was instrumental in bringing Eli here, but we now have integrated the basic research, the clinical research. The clinical research is becoming more and more part of our overall Medical Center clinical research program.

That's the sort of collaboration that I have, somewhat from a distance—certainly not as an academic, but certainly it's difficult for me to, with a straight face, say "from a distance," I guess, any longer because I have been so involved with the University, but I have tried to promote because I think that's one of the truly great strengths of this University, is our ability to collaborate geographically, of course, with the Medical Center and the College cheek by jowl, and there is so many things that we can do. Even now, with the programs that we see between MAG<![if !supportFootnotes]>[102]<![endif]> and the Medical Center, Eastman School of Music and the Medical Center, and Simon School—there are—and promoting—it's your field, Paul, but these young people who are double majors, who are getting degrees from both the Eastman and the College.

PJB: Unheard of when I was an undergraduate. Unheard of.

GRW: Right.

PJB: Right.

GRW: Just extraordinary, and makes us highly attractive to these outstanding young people who—the physicist who's a flute player or— [laughter] —

PJB: The notion of collaboration, which was really not highly regarded 50 years ago, today is—it seems to me is—it's a sacrament to the culture anymore. Collaboration is essential. You're mentioning the Eastman Institute of Oral Health, as we call it.

GRW: Right.

PJB: I think it's been a long time in coming, and there're a lot of people who have always assumed that that the Eastman Dental Center was part of the University, and when I tell them, "No, it's only in the last quarter century, only the last 25 years or so," maybe a little less than that—

GRW: Less than that.

PJB: Less than that.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[103]<![endif]>

Interviewee : Less than that.

GRW: Yeah.

PJB: - maybe 18, 19 years that it's been a part of the University"—which finally gives some credibility to the notion from 1924 that we created a school of medicine and dentistry.

GRW: Yes.

PJB: Right?

[Laughter]

GRW: Exactly. Exactly.

PJB: We—so much has changed now from your early days and even my early days, when once upon a time the Eastman Kodak Company reigned supreme. As I recall, in the early '80s it employed as many as 60,000-plus people here in the Rochester community. Then with Chester Carlson<![if !supportFootnotes]>[104]<![endif]> and Joe Wilson and company and Xerox and the plants out in your neck of the woods in Webster employing—being the second largest employer, the economic landscape of our community has just—it's—we couldn't even have imagined that the University would be the largest employer.

I think it would be interesting just to hear you on—or to get your perspective on the future, where Rochester's going. Once upon a time, as we recall, if you wanted to shop for a man's suit, you came down to McFarlin's or one of the men's stores downtown.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[105]<![endif]> If you wanted to go to a movie, you came downtown. When Midtown Plaza was opened in 1962, it seems to me curiously and almost a little sad that in 1962, it almost immediately went into—it began the slow and agonizing decline that we see now.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[106]<![endif]> It had its heyday, no doubt, but with the change in the demography of our city and the fortunes of our great industries that we have a different city than we did when you were coming along and when I was coming along. What's your perspective about that, about our future, I think would be very interesting to hear.

GRW: We are part of the, in a sense, history of our nation in the sense that, as I mentioned earlier, 1962, 13 companies headquartered here, Stock Exchange—

PJB: Right.

GRW: - and then—and an absolute jewel not recognized that much by others, but that's fine. They left us alone, and we were doing just fine, thank you very much. Because of technology, of financing, whatever, that whole area, if you will, has been leveled, or was leveled. You had state, federal laws that then applied all over. You had other companies that were coming and buying and merging, so that you no longer had this sort of walled city, if you will, that was extraordinarily prosperous and had all this—was very, very attractive.

You had the suburbanization. I think really Midtown was a response as much as anything else to the suburban malls that were already being developed, but I mean, that's a national phenomenon that we have seen. We've got the reaction to that now, and I've been very pleased to see that Rochester, along with a lot of other cities—and we're not in the forefront of this—is now making available housing within the center city, and we find people now starting to come back to the city.

Even when I was growing up—well, of course, I grew up in the suburbs—you came into the city. You didn't live in the city. You were not—you were out in the towns—the surrounding towns, but the city was where your cultural and other—and shopping activities were, and so you came there. Now that's no longer the case, and I don't think we're gonna see a return to those days. We've got these huge malls that provide free parking, and we are, if nothing, a mobile society with our cars.

What we have—because of the loss of manufacturing and just the change in economics, we no longer have the job opportunities that were available when I was growing up for someone with no better than a high school education to get a good, well-paying job that could support a family, support, if you wanted to have a camper and to go out—or a cottage up in the St. Lawrence Seaway or the Finger Lakes, to do that as well. Many of the boys that I went through high school with—their chief aim in life was to get a job on the production line as their father had and be set for life. It's not there any longer. So that has resulted in a continuing hollowing out of a large part of our society and our community. It's hit the inner city particularly hard, but it's true throughout.

So that we now have the opportunity to reinvent ourselves. My fear has been, for the last decade that we wouldn't do it in time—or wouldn't do it before all of this talent and experience left us. We're a very mobile society. One of the true advantages we've had in Rochester is that once people live here, they don't wanna leave, by and large. They really would like to be able to stay here, to raise a family, to educate that family.

That's been to our advantage. It's been a glue, if you will, that has kept a lot of the talent that was let go at Kodak and Xerox and Bausch & Lomb, kept those people here, looking—forming their own businesses, so that we still have much of that expertise in the optical and imaging areas. I think just in time, just in time, we are now seeing with the—our appointment is at Photonics<![if !supportFootnotes]>[107]<![endif]> —recipient for the Photonics funds and the monies that the state has obligated itself to us for the—on the regional development council that Joel and Danny Wegman have led and led so successfully in terms of the process, because what that has done—by the process they engaged the entire Rochester and surrounding community in ways that had never occurred before.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[108]<![endif]>

New York—and I can speak this from my own personal experience as a lawyer practicing in this area—is one of the worst of the states in terms of small governmental units— developing small governmental units, towns, villages, school districts, fire districts. Once you create one of those, they wanna hold on to whatever—they may not have much, but it's theirs.

PJB: Yeah. Yeah.

GRW: It inhibits the cooperation that is now absolutely essential.

PJB: Mm-hmm.

GRW: I see that as a true opportunity for this community. We still have talent here, and I think we can attract even more talent. We have water, and a lot of the country is lacking that and is going to be even in worse shape, I think, as we go along. That is another advantage.

You know one of the five goals we set for our next—for our tenth president of the University, when we went on this search: someone who would be comfortable in a community leadership role, and didn't we get that in spades. Joel has, of course, accomplished so much with the other four. This is perhaps the goal that is most visible. He has embraced it by default in many respects. We find ourselves the eighth largest private employer in the entire state of New York. That is mind-boggling—

PJB: It is.

GRW: - when—when you—when I think of the relatively small college I came to back in 1955, and we now are the eighth largest private employer in the entire state of New York. Not only that, but we are the engine for these new businesses. We are—I submit we have a healthier economy now than we did when we were fat, dumb, and happy maybe 20 years ago and relying almost exclusively on three companies.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[109]<![endif]> Wonderful companies, strong companies, but as we've seen, the world changes, and when your base is that concentrated and you get hit with just one, much less all three, you suffer horribly.

I now see us with a much broader and stronger base again in terms of the technology in so many aspects—the IT, certainly optics—coming from the University. Again, to mention RIT<![if !supportFootnotes]>[110]<![endif]> as well. RIT, I think, and U of R—it complements the U of R very much, and we are blessed in this community with many very good colleges—institutions of higher education and quite variable, which is good, which is actually very, very good.

I am, I guess, reasonably optimistic that—I'm not sure we're ever again going to see the days when we have one or two just almost monopolistic— [laughter] —companies through which money funnels. It just—the world isn't built that way any longer. It doesn't operate that way.

And so we really need to develop that large base of business and industry, and that combined with the natural attractions that we have as an area, as a community—the Finger Lakes, Lake Ontario, just talking about water— the cultural aspects, Eastman School of Music. Another thing that Joel really put his resources and reputation on the line early on was the East End expansion for the Eastman School of Music, when we developed and expanded the School of Music, which has been, like I said, a wonderful gift not only to the Eastman but to the entire community.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[111]<![endif]>

PJB: You know—on a perhaps closing note, I have often thought that it was during the era of Rush Rhees that President Rhees ushered the University into the 20 ^th century, and it is in the era of the Joel Seligman presidency that we see this administration ushering the University under very different circumstances into the 21 ^st century. Does that—does that resonate?

GRW: I think that's—I think that's right, and I guess I should put a—give perhaps a caveat that as a history major and as a historian, I know, should know better than to assess someone who is still in the middle of—of his—his term, but I have no hesitation in saying that I think that Joel Seligman is going to go down in the history of this University and rank right up there with Rush Rhees.<![if !supportFootnotes]>[112]<![endif]>

PJB: Yes. I think so. Bob Witmer, it has been for our University archivist and for me a privilege to listen to you tell us about Rochester and the University and your life here. As I've listened to you, I've thought—and I'm sure that Melissa agrees—that what we have heard today is an astonishing and important piece of this institution's oral history, of its living history. I just really, from the bottom of my heart, want to thank you.

I've known you a long time, and you have known me, but I really wanna thank you for sharing as candidly and openly and completely as you have, what you have. You are truly a treasure of this institution who will go down—just as Joel Seligman and Rush Rhees have gone down in history, Robert Witmer and all of the Witmers behind him will go down in history as a part of the great legacy of this institution, so thank you very, very much.

GRW: Well, thank you, Paul, but, again, I owe so much to this University and to the people who make it, such as you.