By Joe Romano ’63
Dr. Jean I. Brooks was the best history professor I have ever had, and I have a Master of Arts degree in history from the University of Tennessee and have taken courses at Rutgers University. At the time she seemed so old, although she was younger then than I am now. Dr. Brooks was unmarried and the perfect Puritan. She considered her abilities a gift from God, that they were not really hers and that it was up to her to practice stewardship with whatever talents she had been given.
She did not drink or smoke and exercised regularly. Periodically we would see her motoring by Rankin Hall at a fast clip wearing the high top sneakers the athletic department had ordered for her. Dr. Brooks was one of the first women to graduate, about 1918, from the University of Chicago with a Ph.D. in history. Her dissertation focused on the topic of how Britain and France colonized the islands of the South Pacific, or as she put, “How they stole half of Asia.”
Each year she taught four or five sections of freshman “Western European Civilization” as well as two or three upper class courses. Over a three-year period she alternately offered every course she thought necessary for a history major’s education. But a history major had to pay attention, or he or she would lose out, since the class would not be offered again out of cycle.
There was quite a bit of test stealing in those days, but no one ever stole a Dr. Brooks test or exam. She had a small safe in her apartment in what is now called the Old College, and she locked away every copy of the test questions plus the blue books in which the students had written their answers. She also had each student sign a pledge on the last page of the blue book, “I have neither given nor received information on this test.”
At first I did not sign my tests that way. I wrote, “I have not cheated on this test.” So she called me in and asked, “Does this mean that you gave information but did not receive it?” I said no. “Then why do you sign it that way?’ I was a little ashamed, but said, “I don’t know how to spell received.” “It’s ‘I’ before ‘e’, except after ‘c,’” she said, and that was that.
She was fearless. There were many ex-servicemen at Tusculum, and just about all of them were good people who added maturity and stability to the campus. There was one man, however, who threw his weight around. He was quite a bully, and had even broken his dog’s leg. One morning he burst late into class glaring at anyone who got in his way. Dr. Brooks looked down from behind her podium, removed her reading glasses and said, “Mr. Andrews, you’re not as tough as you think you are,” then again placed her glasses on her nose and resumed her lecture.
She refused to compromise her high standards, and failed about one third of her freshman students in the required “Western Civilization.” Ken Hellyer ’63 and I admired her standards of excellence and decided to major in history, but that did not vitiate the intimidation she engendered. There was nothing more terrifying than confronting a blank physical map test of Europe and having to decipher which squiggly lines were the Rhine or Po rivers, or which set of bumps were the Carpathian Mountains.
Dr. Brooks lectured from yellowed, handwritten notes that smelled more of Woodrow
Wilson than FDR, but they were still first rate. Like Katherine Hepburn she had essential tremor. Her head shook slightly from side to side, and her voice alternated between the lower and the higher registers. Many students tried to major in history, but she winnowed them out. By our senior year there were only six of us left in our whole class. Outside the classroom she was quite convivial.
Once a year she would invite her history majors over for dinner. It did not occur to me until much later that maybe she washed out history majors until there were just enough to fit around her table. Of course a few days after each dinner she would spring a test on us that would peel off a great deal of our hides.
The best class Dr. Brooks ever taught was “The Intellectual History of Greece and Rome.” She of course plowed through “The Iliad” and “The Odyssey” as well as “The Aeneid.” She dissected the Greek tragedies, and Puritan or not she helped us understand the risqué Greek comedies. Her only comment was, “Why did they have to be so dirty?”
The most turgid course on her rotating schedule was first semester “History of England.” I cannot count the times I had to fight to keep awake in that class. So at registration in January I omitted second semester “History of England” from my schedule. Dr. Brooks’ response was immediate and to the point. “I don’t consider a student a history major if he doesn’t take both semesters of History of England,” she said, her head moving slightly from side to side.
It took maybe five seconds for me to write second semester “History of England” into my schedule. Second semester was better, but not by much. The night before the first test we were studying as usual when we took a break in the lobby of Rankin Hall. “Why don’t we play a short game of hearts?’ One of us suggested, and we did. The idea of getting back to those boring, dry notes and text we found appalling, so we played another hand, and then another, and still another. When we looked up at the clock it was 7:30 a.m. Our test was scheduled for 8 a.m.
We washed up and plodded over to our classroom on the second floor of the library. Of course we had already been exposed to a lot of material in class and from the text, and some of it had stuck. There were many details, however, that we had not studied. So, we had to give the impression that we knew those details without delving too deeply and exposing our ignorance.
I had never believed in miracles, at least not until the day we got back our blue booklet test papers. Dr. Brooks’ only reaction was the strange look she gave me when she handed me my blue booklet. I held my breath and opened it to the first page. There looking back at me was a C-, a minor miracle indeed.
Eventually I teased out what had happened. Dr. Brooks categorized each of us according to our grades on previous tests. If a student wanted to go from a C to a B for example, writing one B test paper would not be enough. That student would have to write two B test papers in a row to reach the B tier. It was the same when the student went down a grade—two papers in a row.
My test paper was apparently so dreadful that with just that one test I dropped more than one whole grade. But that was ok with me. I had survived a giant case of feckless immaturity.
Still, when I look back it had been quite a coup to pull off.
The last time I saw Dr. Brooks was the following May. I was a junior. I was writing my answers to the “History of England” final. This time I had studied and was prepared. As usual I was still writing after nearly everyone had finished. Only fellow history major, Paul Lewin ’63, was there with me. Dr. Brooks had always accommodated me and waited until I was finished, and for that I was very grateful. This time she stood up, gathered the other students’ test booklets and said in her fluttering voice, “Mr. Romano, Mr. Lewin, I have a faculty meeting. When you are finished come to our meeting room, knock on the door and hand in your test booklets.”
In the fifty-six years since that day I have never been more flattered. Dr. Brooks knew there was cheating on campus. That is why she locked away her tests and blue books. But she knew there would be no cheating in that classroom that day.
The next day before we headed home I went to stop by Dr. Brooks’ office to see if I could find out my final grade. The door was closed, and I heard raised voices from way down the hall. One of the voices belonged to President Raymond Rankin.
“You need to join our church in town.”
“You know I’m a member of the chapel up the road,” Dr. Brooks said.
“I understand, but it would be advisable for you to change your membership.”
I didn’t really understand the argument. Both were Presbyterian churches.
“I am committed to my little church. I’m at home there,” she said, her voice rising with each word.
President Rankin could barely contain himself. “I insist,” he said. There was a scraping of a chair across the floor.
“Then you have my resignation,” Dr. Brooks said, her voice quavering but strong.
“You have a contract. I’ll sue,” Rankin said.
“See my association,” Dr. Brooks said, steel in her voice.
The doorknob began to turn, and I walked away as fast as I could. That was it. We were all to be deprived of her excellence, her high standards, for our senior year. In her place was a good man and a fine teacher, Luther Mundy. I liked him immediately. He was sitting behind a table at registration. There was a painted sign taped to the table that said, “Dr. Luther Mundy.” He had scratched out the Dr. and wrote Mr.
“I’m just about all done with my doctorate,” he said when he saw me staring at the sign.
“My dissertation is completed, and I’ve passed my orals, but I haven’t received official confirmation yet.”
President Rankin had over the years received two honorary doctoral degrees and insisted on being call Dr. Rankin. This struck us as hypocritical and phony, and here was this man who was earning a legitimate doctorate but would take nothing for granted until he received final word.
Yes, Luther Mundy was a good man, but through no fault of his own he was not Dr.
Brooks. A few years later my wife Sue and I had gone back to graduation when Mr. Mundy sought us out.
“I’m leaving the college,” he said. “The official reason is I want to get back to my expertise, which is church history. But it’s actually because of that man, Rankin.” And we never saw him again, either.