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- Dr. Jean Battle
College of Education Faculty Oral Histories
Dr. Jean Battle
JB: That is correct. We were the largest, but it didn’t help as much as it should have. We were growing so fast that we were always playing catch-up.
LB: The College of Education had an education program for Guatemala during the 1960s. Can you tell me about it?
JB: Yes, it was a program that came about because Dr. Spivey, President of Florida Southern College, had a biology program there. Lucy, my wife, and I had paid our own way to go down there. When I returned, I got Bob Shannon to be in charge of a project to help their teachers. He liked those kinds of things. When I met with our students and asked them about going down there for two years, they said no. They would rather go to London. We had a few students who went to Guatemala, but Shannon then started the London Summer Program. The students paid their way, but we paid Shannon’s salary. It became a very successful program. So people weren’t for it because they thought we were wasting money. But we were trying to educate our students as to how we are all one world.
LB: There was an exchange program for students between the College of Education and the University of Massachusetts. Do you remember that?
JB: Oh, yes. Bill Dannenburg had contacts there, and he was in charge of that program. The program was very successful. The Massachusetts students were very good and loved to come to Florida in January. Our students did well and had a good experience at the University of Massachusetts as well.
LB: I had recently become a member of the College of Education faculty in 1968 when you made a trip to Russia. Did you find the Russians friendly and open to your visiting their schools?
JB: Lucy and I went to Russia during the summer. We paid our own way. The Russians were friendlier to us then we would have been to them coming to America. They brought American flags out when we were doing our videos. I was very impressed. On the other hand, as for the people in charge and those we met at the Kremlin, they seemed to be uneducated. They were a lot more anxious to become friendly and learn about us than we were, I didn’t trust them. That trip was one of the nicest ones we took. Lucy and I traveled every summer. She would go to the bank to borrow the money to go to Europe and we would pay it back the next year. We were trying to learn about the world. I was trying to get the faculty interested in learning about the world and that we are one family, but some thought it was a waste of money to travel to those other countries.
LB: In doing my library research I discovered that you and Bill Dannenburg had gathered materials to write a book about Raymond Robins, the former owner of Chinsegut. Can you tell me about that?
JB: Yes. Bill Dannenburg and I gathered information Raymond Robins, but someone else published a book about him before we could write ours. I have the book. Actually his sister had the money and owned Chinsegut, but he lived there and acted like he owned it. I don’t know how she got her money, but she was an activist in Chicago for various causes and purchased Chinsegut as a retreat house. Raymond Robins had a wonderful assistant who had been an actress. She was well known in England where she had performed in Norwegian plays which were very popular in London. She made it possible for Robins to go to Alaska and participate in the “Gold Rush”. He later became head of the American Red Cross and was in Moscow after the communists took over.
LB: I read that he met with Joseph Stalin regularly and tried to establish a better relationship between the United States and Russia.
JB: He tried really hard to build a better relationship between the United States and Russia, but he never got anywhere in his meetings with Stalin. We never had a conversation with him about that because we figured that was over our heads.
LB: Were there any unusual or perhaps humorous events that you recall from your days at USF?
JB: Well there is one humorous story I can relate. When Dr. Sidney French, Dean of the USF College of Basic Studies resigned as dean he came to the College of Education as a faculty member in Higher Education Department. President Allen made him Dean Emeritus and gave him a parking spot. One morning when he came to campus and parked his car in the parking spot a student said to him, “You can’t park there Dean French.” He asked why not? The student said, “Because that spot is reserved for Dean Emeritus and you’re Dean French.” Another story not nearly as funny was when all of the deans woke up to find ducks on their front lawn. It seemed like it was a practical joke that students had taken ducks from Busch Gardens and placed them on the lawns of each of the USF deans.
LB: When you first arrived on campus at USF, did you envision the tremendous growth that the University would have over this first fifty years?
JB: We all thought that there would be more students than we could handle the first year, but there wasn’t. We were getting hit right and left by the University of Tampa. They kept saying that we were new and not accredited which were true. However, we were accredited by the time our first students were ready to graduate in 1963. Then the students started rolling in and we couldn’t stop it. I still think we accepted too many students. I tried to get John Allen to slow down, but he wouldn’t. He took as many as he could get. We weren’t getting the money from the state for the number of students we had. We had more students every year than we had money for. He made a mistake on that one, but it’s the only mistake he made. He did a marvelous job developing an outstanding foundation for the University while being attacked from the right and the left.
LB: Dean Battle and Mrs. Battle, I thank you for inviting me into your home and allowing me to conduct this interview. Most of all I want to thank you for your tremendous contributions to the College of Education and to the University of South Florida.
A Historical Overview of the Johns Committee
End of Interview