Graham, Charles J. (1929-2016)

https://reflections.mndigital.org/catalog/stc:6834#/kaltura_audio

Biographical Information: Charles Graham was born in 1929 in Peru, Illinois. In the 1800s, Graham's ancestors emigrated from Ireland to the United States. His family farmed in Illinois, where Graham grew up. After graduating from LaSalle-Peru Township High School and attending one year at a local junior college, Graham attended the University of Illinois to pursue political science. He received his bachelor's degree in 1950, master's degree in 1951, and Ph.D. in 1955. Graham received invaluable experience before heading to Wisconsin State College in 1954, where he taught until 1963. During this time he also took a year off to work as a legislative assistant to US Senator William Proxmire, who was elected in 1957 to replace Joseph McCarthy. Upon leaving River Falls in 1963, he accepted a position as Dean of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Wisconsin State College in Whitewater. Graham stayed at Whitewater until 1971 when he was named St. Cloud State president. Graham was still St. Cloud State president at the time of this interview, but would leave shortly to become the president of Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota. He passed away December 23, 2016 and survived by wife Bonnie and three sons.

Transcript Summary: Graham discussed his family background and his educational history. He shared an anecdote about an ancestor who fought at the Battle of Waterloo. Graham said that his entire family always farmed until his father decided to go to college to become a teacher. He discussed his college career and the internship he obtained in Washington, D.C., which gave him valuable political experience and sparked his interest in administration.

Graham chronicled his years teaching in Wisconsin, as well as his time working with Senator William Proxmire. He detailed his impressions of Whitewater, a town he described as tumultuous and heavily affected by the turmoil of the 1960s, as it was near several large cities, including Chicago and Milwaukee. Graham touched on his appointment to a New Mexico college that he had to turn down. That appointment created a firestorm because Graham was not of Spanish origin in a community that was almost entirely Spanish. He saw St. Cloud State University as a change of scenery as well as a good step for his career.

Graham discussed his presidency at SCSU, the changes he implemented, and general observations about the faculty and students. He focused on the advent of collective bargaining, discussing how it affected the faculty. Graham also gave attention to his goal of wanting to develop and polish more career-oriented programs outside of teaching. He also discussed his attempts to make students more internationally aware, as well as his goal to unify the campus physically after the rapid addition of new buildings in the 1960s. Graham discussed the idea of consolidation, meaning he had attempted to take all these new programs that had been added to improve the academic quality to benefit the students.