Elmer A. Otte, '36

Mid-term in 1931-32 I arrived at Lawrence on a Henry Wriston "Depression scholarship." I was 21 and had just come from a cub reporter job on The Green Bay Press-Gazette. Now I was selling shoes in Kaukauna, which I continued to do while at Lawrence. Each job paid $8 per week.

Ted Cloak was my speech mentor, and Howard Troyer tried to tone down this overblown writer. For me, each assignment was double, one for class and the other for tutoring after class. Troyer beat on me, made me simplify, write tighter, and use images.

I owe my career success to them and others at Lawrence: forty years in advertising, always writing; author of nine published books, three new this year. Besides author and poet, I have been blessed as a lecturer, including presenting world papers in Rome and San Francisco. If it were not for my Lawrence experience, I might still be selling shoes. Lawrence turned me into a lifetime student. That's a better fit for me.

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