Alumni Share Their Knox Love Stories

In the January 2009 issue of the Gizmogram, Knox asked alumni to share their college love stories. We heard from alumni whose love blossomed in a dorm stairwell, during Flunk Day, and in the Gizmo. We heard from an alumnus who wasn't so lucky at love, and someone who didn't go to Knox, but met her mate thanks to the Knox Besançon program and the Knox friends she made while there. And yes, we even heard from a Knox alumnus who will be marrying his high school sweetheart -- a Monmouth grad (horror of horrors!) -- this summer.

From Bill Shaffer '57:

"Knox and love and I never mixed too well. In four years, I was desperately in love with every coed I saw. It was the '50s. It was Galesburg. It was grand. I would sit in the Gizmo nursing a cup of coffee and offering my Beta pin to anything walking by. No takers. One sorority pledge once accepted my pin for a few months as a community service project.

"It wasn't that I wasn't a hip guy. I had a charge account at Fred Schubach's and wore all the latest Ivy League stuff. The polo shirt with the alligator on it. The skin-tight chino slacks with a belt in the back. The James Dean fire-engine red McGregor windbreaker. It didn't matter.

"Years later, when calling around for information for Knox Magazine class notes, I happened to dial one of those sweet young things -- now a sweet mature thing. She answered the phone and, when I said, 'Hi, it's Bill Shaffer, ' and she did what she always did when I'd call her at Whiting Hall.

She hung up."

From Thomas "Tad" Donovan '59:

"I almost made it through my four years at Knox with no serious attachments; however, early in the spring semester of my senior year, I was sitting in the Gizmo (which I rarely did) and this young woman (Judith Martz, a freshman that year) came in and sat down in the same booth and proceeded to initiate a conversation. She said she had seen me at various times on campus and had wanted to meet me. We hit it off and began to date and, to make a long story short, we were engaged before the end of the semester.

"We married in March 1960, while I was a graduate student in chemistry at the University of Illinois, and we will celebrate our 50th anniversary on March 4, 2010. The marriage has resulted in three children (Thomas A. Jr., Anne, and James) and, to date, five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. After receiving my Ph.D., I taught at Indiana State College (now Indiana State University) for two years, returned to Knox and taught for four years (1964-67), and then moved on to Buffalo, New York, and taught at Buffalo State College from 1968 through 1991 before retiring. I still wonder how different (not better!) my life would have been had I not been in the Gizmo on that early spring day in 1959. My wife left Knox after her freshman year but subsequently completed her education by earning an associates degree at Erie Community College (Amherst, New York) and B.S. and MBA degrees at the University of Buffalo."

From Stan '72 and Allane Bosse Eastberg '72:

"While attending the opening convocation at Knox in 1968, President Umbeck asked everyone to stand and look around at the other students in the auditorium. Mr. Umbeck told us that there was a high likelihood that we would meet our life partner from someone located in the room that day. Everyone laughed, including us. While it is possible that we saw each other that day and even more likely that we shook hands at Pumphandle, our romance really began on Flunk Day 1969, when we spent the entire day together. Following the Flunk Day date, we to attended the 1969 Sorority Spring Formal and then dated exclusively throughout the rest of our time at Knox. We graduated on June 3, 1972 and were married a week later on June 10, 1972.

"Early in the relationship, we decided that studying together would be a significant part of our dating. Stan maintains that having these study dates are the main reasons why he received the award for having the greatest grade point improvement between freshman and senior year.

"In 1975, we relocated from Illinois to Gig Harbor, Washington where we still live. Now some 36 years later, we are both still very happily married. We have been blessed with two daughters, Jennifer (30) and Adriane (26) and will soon become grandparents. In June 2008, we both decided to retire so we would have more time to travel and to enjoy life. Allane had a great career as a teacher (preschool and middle school math) while Stan spent more than 30 years managing executive development for Weyerhaeuser Company, a Fortune 100 company in the Forest Products industry.

"To this day, we both have a great fondness for Flunk Day and believe our relationship is truly a Knox love story."

"I joined Knox in Besançon in 1980-81. I didn't know a single person when I got on the plane to go to France for a year. Then, during the summer of '81, a few weeks after I returned, my friends Nancy Borman '82 and Brian Gaynor '82, who became my friends that year in Besançon, brought Kent Slayton '82 over to my house. I met him on the front porch of my childhood home. It wasn't love at first sight, but Kent and I gradually became closer over the next eight years or so, and we were married in 1992. We now have two beautiful kids, Kevin (13) and Grace (8). Even though I'm not a Knox grad, many Knox grads, including Nancy, Brian and many others, are among our best friends. So while I did not attend Knox, it has had a profound impact on my life."

From Jules Howell Arnold '92:

"My husband, Tim Arnold '93, and I met at Knox when I was a sophomore and he was a freshman. He lived in Conger 1; I had friends who lived in Conger 2. What began with a casual wave from stairwell to suite eventually blossomed into romance. Our first date took place in CFA, where we saw a production of Arms and the Man. Many more dates followed, and we were married in 1992.

"I have always felt that we were destined to meet, because when I was a freshman, I volunteered for the Knox Admission office, and Tim's name was on the list of high school seniors that I was supposed to call and persuade to enroll at Knox. We didn't speak by phone at that time, but I remember noticing his name and school information and getting a feeling of anticipation, as if I somehow knew that this person was going to be very important to me. A short time later, he was -- and, of course, still is."

From Tyler Hill '08:

"My name is Tyler Hill '08 and I am going to marry a Monmouth grad this June. We started dating our junior year of high school in Naperville, and I went to Knox and she went to Monmouth. I was on the football team, so each year we had to survive the rivalry, and she had to sit on Knox's sideline. We made it through though, and had some fun along the way."