HB: How long do you think its has been since you’ve been back at Scripps?
AC: It has been just a couple months because I have actually stayed really involved at Scripps. After I graduated, a couple years later I became the Alumni trustee and I was on the board for six years, and as part of my board duties I was on the investment committee and so I’ve stayed on the investment committee since I was an alumni trustee. So that’s been about fifteen years and I’m vice chair of the investment committee so I’m actually not – we have our meetings in Pasadena but I do go back every couple months or so if I get invited to something, and it’s more beautiful than I remember, I appreciate it a lot more.
HB: So, tell me a little about why you chose Scripps.
AC: I grew up in the Chicago area in a suburb called Kenilworth, which was very small – 3,000 people – but I went to a very large high school (something east), and we had about 4,000 kids in our entire school, which was fairly large. I always felt that it was a little large although we did have the opportunity of a smaller high school, like Poly, but I decided not to, um, but it just felt a little big in the end, so I wanted a smaller school, number one, and number two… Oh actually two main reasons why I ended up as Scripps were I took five years of Latin because in our middle school the only language that was offered was Latin so I took an equivalent of a year of Latin in seventh and eighth grade, and I took an AP Latin class when I was a senior in high school, and my Latin teacher was this funny, old, interesting lady who also taught Greek, so I took a semester of Greek as well, and, um, we had a college counselor that I worked with and when she saw that I had that kind of humanities type background with those languages, she thought that Scripps might be a good fit. Coupled with that, my dad used to come out here on business quite a bit, and so he would come out maybe three of four times a year, and so it seemed like maybe a good place for me to look at would be to come to California because my family would come and then also it was small and also very humanities oriented. In addition, there was some connection between him and John Chandler from University of Chicago, but the main reason was that I heard about it from a college counselor who thought it would be helpful, or interesting, for me because of the Latin and the Greek.
HB: Did that, was that different from your peers at all?
AC: Going to Scripps was very different because being in Chicago, a lot of kids would go to Midwest schools: the big Universities, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, Michigan, or if they went to a smaller school, except for Ivy Leagues, there are a lot of really good small schools in the Midwest. So they went to Kenyon, Denison, Miami of Ohio, Ohio Wesleyan, Carleton College, Macalester, Wesleyan in Connecticut, Connecticut College, Hamilton, and there are so many schools either in the Midwest or back east that people didn’t think a lot about coming to California, unless you had a reason.
HB: Okay, um, what did you study? Did you stick with humanities when you went to Scripps?
AC: The only thing is as soon as I got there my Dad started saying – it was kind of controlling, he always wanted to give advice – would ask what did you, you know you had to take an Economics class, you had to take a money/banking class or something that was real world. He was always concerned that I would be able to go get a job when I graduated so I took an accounting class and the next thing you know I just kinda became an Economics and a political science major, but my favorite classes were always the humanities.
HB: Yeah I love everything they have there. What dorm did you live in?
AC[4:00]: I lived in Mary Routt, which I loved, and I had a great roommate, really nice roommate who was from this area, and California to me at the time when I cam out here was just like this, you know, very different place. It was really fun to have a roommate that was from here so I thought it was kind of exotic. So, It was a great dorm, and in those days, everyone really stayed in the same dorm or tried to for most of our four years. And, a fun thing for me when I was a freshman, second semester, I was elected Mary Routt president, so that was a big deal for me and a lot of fun, and I just have always had an affinity for that dorm, although I did end up living in Dorsey, and then in Toll my senior year, but Mary Routt was my true love as far as dorms go.
HB: What was it like living in the dorms?
AC: It was great! Because after your freshman year we always had singles and in Mary Rout, as you may know, and in Frankel, is that they had the suite system, so we had our single rooms, but it was like you were living with seven other girls because there were four rooms on each side. And so it was really very fun, I enjoyed it.
HB: Were there a lot of traditions, you know, in dorm culture or in general at Scripps?
AC: Well, the thing that we were – because I was president of our dorm, I was always interested in, or, part of my job was the parties and what we would do. We would host, we would have the Thursday night parties, and I can’t think of what the name, do you still have those?
HB: Thursday Night Club?
AC: Yeah they called it something else and it’ll come to me but, um, it was like study hall or study something, and I can’t remember what it is, I’m sorry, but maybe it’ll come to me. So Scripps would usually host the Thursday night parties, and then Friday Nights maybe it would be like CMC, and then there was always, almost always a five-college party on Saturday night. And it would either be at Pomona, or Harvey Mudd, or CMC, but Scripps generally – Oh! They’re “study breaks” – would do the Thursday night study break, but one time we did a, we hosted the Rolling Stones were in town – and they were still quite popular then – and I, at the time was dating somebody who was at Pomona, and he was president of the Phi-Delts so we got together and we hosted a Scripps party where we raffled off two Rolling Stones tickets to the concert. So that was kind of really fun, we all wore the Rolling Stones shirt. That’s not really a tradition, but just something fun that I remember – planning and we had a big turnout and it was a really fun party also doing it with another dorm and a fraternity at Pomona was kind of a novelty too. In terms of the traditions, you know the se- which we mentioned off camera, the senior brunch remember was a big deal. Um, I can’t think of any traditions off had that I remember, I’m sure there were quite a few. Which are the, what do you have now? Maybe it will jog my memory.
HB: Hmm, like the candlelight dinners and stuff like that.
AC: Yeah I didn’t do much of that.
HB: What was it like interacting with other campuses?
AC: Very easy, I always felt like we were on one campus, and I think most of my friends did as well. That’s one of the wonderful things about Claremont is you get that small school feel at each of the five colleges, and yet you always feel like you’re a part of one big consortium, which you are and it really feels that way just in terms of just always using libraries on other campuses and because there were so many interactions between classes with other kids, and actually because of my major I took a lot of classes at CMC and Pomona, so I was always off campus, and also the inter-dining. Each dorm had their own dining room, and we would not necessarily just eat at that dining room, we would move around a lot and we’d also move around campuses and eat. Also because of all the parties I mentioned were five-college oriented, it again really made you feel like you were on one campus.
HB: That sounds very similar.
AC: Oh it is? That’s nice.
HB: What kind of, you know, news or social forums did they have on campus, like were there news publications that were 5C?
AC: there was a five-college newspaper and I think we put out a Scripps paper and I don’t remember, um, it was just kind of part of like the Poly Paw Print or whatever, but nothing that I can really remember as being that noteworthy to me over time, its just that they did have publications and um, but nothing in general.
HB: What about sports, were the sports popular on campus?
AC: No, sports were nothing like they are now, at any age at any level, and what’s really interesting to me is that kids such as yourself, Hilary, are going to Scripps to play a sport. That would have never happened when I was there, ever, but I think it’s wonderful that there are so many of these D3 schools that are recruiting really good athletes and good scholars. That has completely changed since I was there, and I think for the better and I think it’s really fun because it gives kids the opportunities, you know, for that much longer in their life to play sports they love. So, they weren’t a big deal, although I do remember going to a water polo game, a couple water polo games but I was dating someone on the Pomona water polo team, so me and my friends would always go down there and watch but it wasn’t, at least for us, it wasn’t as big of a deal as I think it is now, and also you’ve got that beautiful athletic center, and those beautiful fields. It makes a big difference in terms of the facilities are quite a bit better.
HB: What are other things you can think of that have changed since you graduated?
AC: I think the profile of the Scripps student has changed in the last, you know, thirty odd years. When I was there I think a lot of the girls were not as serious or as maybe career-minded as they are now. I would say probably, there were more girls than not, they, you know, went to college because that’s what you did next and there wasn’t that much of an emphasis really either on themselves or on the environment that there was such a, the need or the interest in in having a demanding career, and also graduate schools, were, you know, obviously there were quite a few that did go to graduate school but I think now there’s more of an emphasis on that, and also getting internships and two-year programs and things like that. So, that’s changed quite a bit. Also there is more interest in the sciences and the math than when I was there.
HB: What was a normal day like when you attended Scripps?
AC: We get up and I remember being late to class occasionally wearing pajama bottoms and putting a sweatshirt on – that probably hasn’t changed. Going down to Mary Routt as a freshman and sophomore eating breakfast, then going to class and you know having free time, going to Denison library, going back to our dorm, eating lunch together. There was always like the set meals were always important because that’s when you would congregate together, just like I’m sure it’s still that way now. Probably pretty much like what you guys have. I don’t think that the college day has probably changed too much, except there’s a lot more interaction on the computers than there is with people I think, or technology that maybe changes the dynamics.
HB: Definitely. So how do you feel – how did you think being at a women’s college was different? Did that affect your decision at all?
AC: No not at all, because of the fact that we are part of all of the Claremonts. If I had just gone to a women’s college where we were kind of isolated or on our own I think that would have been different. I never – the good part about it was there was always a wonderful emphasis on women and what women can achieve and accomplish, but you never felt like you were isolated. I always felt like I was just part of a bigger college, and that was wonderful. So, you know, I never even felt like I was just at a women’s college. It was like, you know, we were a part of something bigger.
HB: What were the stereotypes of the different colleges?
AC: Well, we were the Scrippsies. Are you guys still called that? Ok. And there were a lot of them, including me, coming from a preppy town in Chicago, I came to college and I wore a like very preppy little Lacoste shirts and pony tails and ribbons in my hair. So I was probably a little, somewhat of a stereotype, but just, you know, nice girls who dressed well and maybe weren’t very serious, and maybe were a little, um, you know, maybe not as serious. And then, CMC were considered more of the ‘jocks’ or kids – boys and girls at that point, because it had gone co-ed a couple years prior – that were more business oriented or a little more political science oriented. Harvey Mudd was always the, um, you know, the science kinda nerds, and Pitzer was always considered the, you know, definitely not the serious kids at all, like kinda the flaky kids, or the kids that would do, you know, major in sociology or psychology, and then Pomona was always a little stuck up and the kids that were a little smarter – or thought they were smarter. And definitely the Pomona girls did not like the Scripps girls, and I’m not sure if that’s still true today, but that was definitely an underlying theme whenever we went down there. And, again, this is just my point of view – other people may not have felt this way about other, the stereotypes but that’s how I perceived it.
HB: Did people dress differently from campus to campus, or what was the general fashion?
AC: They did a little bit. I think Scripps girls tended to dress a little nicer, um, for the most part. Maybe Pomona was a little preppier as well. And CMC actually was pretty preppy too, but I went there in the 80s – I graduated in 1984. So that was a time when the preppy handbook was out, I mean it was like preppy was definitely in. It was the height of preppiness. So that did emanate through most of the schools. But it was mostly Pomona, CMC, and then Scripps.
HB: Were you able to visit dining halls on other campuses as well?
AC: Yes – yeah we did that, but we would all go together in like groups. We would never go by ourselves because it would just be daring to go by yourself, to just like go and sit at a tale not knowing anybody or, you know, it was always in these little packs that we would go down, but you know because we had all these different dining halls attached to our dorms, we did a lot of kinda dining hall hopping at the campus. So you felt like you moved around probably more than you did.
HB: did you also ever go off campus to eat or to hang out?
AC: Definitely. On the weekends, I went to Walter’s a lot for breakfast, and uh, what’s the other restaurant, there was another big one, um, breakfast place.
HB: I know there’s a diner.
AC: Yeah, it was, I can’t think of the name, but there was two breakfast places we would go to, and I can’t remember the second one, I’m sorry. And then Yani’s, the Greek restaurant – is that still there? And is there an Italian restaurant, which we loved to go to on Thursday nights called la Piccoletta?
HB: I don’t know for sure.
AC: And they had, I don’t know if it was just open on Thursdays or what, but that was the night we would sometimes go down there, and they had like family style so we would all go down there in a big group and eat together, and, so, there was definitely… and enough people had cars so it was really easy to get around. But it wasn’t something we did except for like the la Piccoletta, and then of course there was the – what’s the Mexican restaurant called? Sorry I don’t remember the name if it – so we used to go down there maybe on Saturday or Friday nights.
HB: Yeah I can’t think of it.
AC: I’m sorry about that.
HB: Oh no, not a problem. Were there any hot-button issues that you can think of on campus while you were there?
AC: You know, there really weren’t. And maybe it was because I was not aware of any, but it was nothing like it is now, in terms of just social awareness, openness about different issues, you know, one of the big things that happened – Reagan came to visit during his first term which was really sort of a big deal, but that really wasn’t campus specific at all. And, you know there were probably things going on, but I wasn’t really that political, but I do know that we didn’t hear about a lot of stuff, we weren’t interested in a lot of things that you guys are interested in now – at least I wasn’t. You know, I probably should have been, but that, to me, has changed dramatically.
HB: What about attitudes towards queer and homosexual students on campus or on other campuses?
AC: It was not even really talked about, and that was what I was trying to allude to earlier. If it was there, it was very kind of under the radar. There was no prejudice, because people didn’t really talk about it. Maybe if they talked about it, it wasn’t open on campus at all. It was very much kind of hidden, but not hidden on purpose, at least from where I came from in my group of friends, we just didn’t really talk about it, and people were not as open and as comfortable talking if they were, um, you know, different, I mean in terms of, they would not feel comfortable enough to be accepted I think, and so they just kind of stayed under the radar. And when I look back, yeah there was a lot more of it going on, and maybe I wasn’t as aware of it. It was just more of an undertone if anything.
HB: What about people of color and minorities? Was the issue of race ever discussed?
AC: Um, no, not really, and you know I would… coming from Chicago where we didn’t have as many minorities or anything, I think I would have noticed it. I think people were very welcoming. There was never an issue, it was just more were you a nice person, were you a nice girl, were you somebody I wanted to be friends with, but I never felt like, from my point of view, that it was ever an issue.
HB: Can you tell me a little about classes – like what were the Scripps requirements?
AC: well there was humanities. It was much more intense – now it’s just three classes, is that correct? I think it was a couple years that we took humanities classes and there was a language requirement – probably a year or so. I don’t remember all the requirements, to tell you the truth.
HB: What were the required humanities classes like? Were there specific categories that you picked from?
AC: there was music – a music theory type of class, there was an art history kind of a class, um they were very much more specific and not as broad. I may have taken a kind of a sort of humanities class maybe our first semester, and I could be wrong, because it was quite a few years ago, but I do recall after that you could pick your specific classes related to arts and humanities.
HB: How – what was the use of technology in teaching, and how do you think that’s changed?
AC: None. At all. In fact, we were just learning, there was like a computer room off the humanities court I remember, and people were just – you could take a course learning “Basic”, which is like, you know, the program, the software program, but other than that, there was really no use of computers. If you wanted to type your paper, you type it on a typewriter. And, there was absolutely nothing. The big thing was having a phone in your room, you could bring your own phone. Maybe someone would have a TV, but that was it, which I know is unbelievable to kids these days.
HB: How would you communicate with teachers or other students?
AC: You walk down the hall. Teachers – I would never call a teacher up on the phone, you would walk into their office, and if they weren’t there, you would leave a note just saying, “I wanna come see you,” same thing with friends, or you would just walk over to a different dorm, just kind of chat. There was a lot more one-on-one, a lot more interaction verbally which was great, I mean that’s just the way we did things. We didn’t know any differently or any better, and it worked fine.
HB[00:20:29]: Did you talk to your family often?
AC: You know, I probably talked to my family once a week, maybe, not even. And when I see all these kids, including my nephews and my nieces, and they’re texting their parents like all the time every day, I’m thinking I would not have liked that, I mean maybe you guys are used to that, because that’s what you do and that’s what you’ve always done, but I loved the freedom. I mean, I came all the way from Chicago, um, my parents trusted me, I didn’t really get in any trouble, so there really wasn’t the need on their part to be checking in with me. And, they were pretty good about leaving me alone. And since we were, you know, two-hour time difference, and we were so far geographically, it was just, you know I don’t even remember having a regular call with them. I think I probably talked to them once a week, but it was nothing like, they never had any idea what my day-to-day life was like, they didn’t – unless I was forthcoming and told them, either when we got together at thanksgiving or they came out to visit or Christmas break – but it was nothing like it is today. They had no idea about details about relationships, classes, any of that stuff. It was like when you went to college, you kinda became an adult, and as long as you didn’t get in trouble and you did fine and didn’t do anything stupid, there was much more kind of freedom associated with that. Although that was how I felt. And I’m thinking, you know, I have a daughter that’s a freshman in high school, and one that’s in middle school, and you know, I think about my freshman going to college in four years and, you know, I don’t want to talk to her all the time, but will that be – maybe she’ll feel the same way, maybe she won’t, but it’s gonna be really very different and I – that’s a big topic with both parents and kids. It’s just the frequency of the communication, which I think is very interesting, it changes your college experience.
HB: A lot of the freedom I’m sure that plays a part into parties, and stuff on campus. Can you tell me about parties – were there annual parties?
AC: There were definitely annual parties. There were – there was the toga party at Pomona, at the Phi-Delt House, there was the Harwood Halloween party, there – Harvey Mudd always had… give me some names of the parties and I’ll tell you if they were – Harvey Mudd had an annual party that was always fun.
HB: We have Monte Carlo.
AC: Yeah, we had that, at CMC?
HB: Mhm. We have a “Eurotrash” party.
AC: No, there was no such term as “Eurotrash” (laughing).
HB: There’s a “Wild, Wild West” party.
AC: Yeah, do the fraternities at Pomona have, um… do you guys have like weekly like five-college parties? Because parties were a big part of the social life. That was it, you would go to these parties, and that was fun because you me a lot of people, and there was alcohol – a lot of alcohol – always, and there was no restriction on it, really no talk about it or anything. Are you guys – do you guys have, are allowed to serve alcohol at the parties. Oh, you are. Do they have limits, or do you see campus security involved? I mean maybe they were there and I never noticed, but I just always got the impression that college campuses now are just a lot more careful about allowing alcohol at parties, but you can have kegs and all that? Ok. But that was a big part of it, and a lot of it also was-revolved around the fact that most of, 90% of the kids lived on campus – we all lived on campus, so on the weekends that was our social life was to get together. Now when we were seniors, a lot of, or some of the girls lived in either Allen house or Senior House – do you still have that? Or the senior apartments, near, you know, Routt and Frankel? That was still a pretty small percentage of the student population. Most, even seniors, most people would stay in the dorms, and we’d stay on campus on the weekends. Even kids that live close, and my parents moved to Pasadena when I was a sophomore, so even though they lived only a half an hour away, for most of my years at Scripps, I wouldn’t even think about going home on the weekends. Again, it was just this freedom issue and I have my life and there was plenty of activity. So you just stayed there, which I really liked. I think that’s a really important part of college life; it’s just feeling like you’re part of a community, you didn’t go off on the weekends and do your own thing.
HB[00:24:49]: Did you meet a lot of people at parties?
AC: Yeah, always. Yes, and we would have our little group that we would go with, and we would meet little groups from CMC or Pomona. That’s how you met people, was going to these parties – at least for me and most of my friends, and then a few classes. Mostly that more than getting involved in clubs or organizations.
HB: Did that play a part into, like, relationships? Or what was kind of the overall thought about that?
AC: Yeah, I think just like, you know, as it is probably nowadays – you meet people at a party, or wherever and you end up dating, or getting to know each other. I think that’s probably stayed the same. Do you think?
HB: It’s a lot more hook-up oriented now instead of relationships.
AC: Now, tell me, what does the word “hook-up” mean? I hear, I mean my freshman talks about that and I’m like, “what does this word mean?” because it makes me a little nervous!
AK: That’s maybe a discussion we should save for after.
HB: For a freshman in high school, it’s a little different than in college.
AC: The way I would interpret it, is probably not, I mean, there was more dating, than hooking up in the way you guys probably describe it. But um, that’s kinda funny because people use that term all the time now, and it can mean a lot of different things. So as a mom of a freshman, I’m like, “Ok, what does this really mean?” (laughing). But I would say, I mean, you know, there was that too, you’re at college, I mean, that just, it happens. But there were certainly a lot of relationships. Not so much that way now?
HB: I think there’s probably less relationships. So, relationships were pretty common, you think?
AC: Yeah, yeah.
HB: So what did you do right after graduation?
AC[00:26:42]: I ended up working and going into the into the investment field, which I really have been in since I’ve graduated, and I interviewed at a lot of these different firms, like banks for their internship/two-year training programs, I interviewed at carnation, a lot of different either marketing or management jobs and then I also met – and this is where I ended up working – a scripps trustee, or someone who is still actually a trustee – Phil Swann. I met him, I think at graduation and I think a friend of mine or an acquaintance of mine knew his son from high school here in South Pas and she somehow hooked me up with him or I met him, and so I met him at graduation and I got the offer to work for him on graduation day at a money management firm here in Pasadena. Actually, I was working for one and I started working with him in August of 1984 when I graduated, and actually I started for him in June, and in August he started his own firm so I went with him and we were a five person firm and it was wonderful to learn the investment business from the ground up, we did everything, and so it was a great opportunity. And then I worked with him for nine years, and he still – I still consider him my mentor. He was really the biggest help to me in terms of my career. And then I went to a much larger investment council firm, and I was a portfolio manager for nine years and now I am the Chief Investment Officer for Ralph M. Parson’s Foundation. And so I am still in the investment business and I do sit on investment committees – Scripps and some others. So, I’ve stayed in the same profession all these years.
HB[00:28:22]: Do you think Scripps prepared you well for the “real world’?
AC: I think it did, in terms of learning how to communicate, learning how to write, even though in our business, you don’t write a lot. Even writing a letter to a client, or writing for a request, you need to know how to express yourself and I think it was also really helpful in terms of learning about different parts of life that you just don’t learn about once you start working because you’re so focused on your career or whatever else – family life – that you know, having the opportunity to learn about the history of music or the history of art or things that are part of the real, big world, is really important, I think, and it’s something that you should really appreciate because you don’t always have the time and luxury to sit back and learn this stuff, which is really good stuff.
HB: Yeah! That’s so interesting. Is there anything else that I didn’t ask that you want to elaborate on at all?
AC: No, not really. But, it’d be interesting to hear, if I asked you guys the same questions what your answers would be, because I’d like to see the similarities and what’s changed. But I do think that students are so much more aware of what’s going on in the world politically, but again, they don’t spend as much time on the humanities type things, or just reading books and literature, and I think you guys are much more politically aware which is great but you know its all at the expense of other things as well, but that’s it!
HB: Well, thank you so much! We really appreciate your contribution to our project.
