GRAUEL BOOK OFFERS WISDOM OF `PROFESSOR'

Although he retired in 1971, to many people H.O. Grauel is still The Professor.

A charismatic individual with a love for literature, Grauel taught English at Southeast Missouri State University for 43 years. In 1975, the university's then-new language arts building was named in his honor.

"Dr. Grauel is so well known, really an institution here at the university," said John C. Bierk of Cape Girardeau, a longtime companion, university colleague and former student of Grauel's.

Grauel, 91, has been slowed in recent years by illness. But a just- published book of essays of the retired Cape Girardeau professor, edited by Bierk, provides some glimpses of the English professor's life and personality, from his childhood in Findlay, Ohio, to his teaching career at Southeast.

"Much of the material in the essays actually involves portions of the history of the university," said Bierk. "If they had not been written down, they would have been lost."

The book, "The Inimitable Professor H.O. Grauel: His Essays on This and That," was recently published by the Southeast Missouri State University Press.

Copies of the book may be purchased at the university bookstore and at the Southeast Missouri University Foundation office in the alumni building on campus.

Bierk will be signing books Saturday as part of an authors' reception at the Show Me Center during Southeast Missouri State University's homecoming celebration. The reception runs from 10:45-11:15 a.m. on the Show Me Center Concourse.

Bierk said Grauel is not up to signing books. But Bierk has had a stamp made of Grauel's signature and plans to use it during the autograph session.

Proceeds from the book will be used to endow the H.O. Grauel Sigma Tau Delta Scholarship Fund at Southeast. Sigma Tau Delta is a national English honorary society.

Bierk said he established the scholarship after Grauel retired. But in recent years, with increasing tuition and low interest rates, no scholarship has been awarded because the fund has not generated sufficient interest income to pay for a full scholarship, he said.

The book sells for $13 if purchased in person; $15 by mail.

Much of the material for the book came from diaries that Grauel kept during his early years at Southeast.

After retiring, Grauel began getting much of the material for the book together in note form.

For years he could be found almost daily in a fourth-floor nook in Kent Library, where he did most of his writing.

Bierk has nothing but praise for his mentor. "He was my major professor as a student. There is no doubt in my mind he is absolutely the best teacher I ever sat under."

In an introduction to the book Bierk wrote of Grauel: "What he taught, and taught brilliantly, was not only Chaucer, Shakespeare, College Grammar, and the History of the English Language, but also the joy of an active curiosity and a never-ending desire to learn."

Bierk was a student of Grauel's from 1950 to 1954, and returned to Southeast in 1957 to teach English. Bierk retired in 1987.

Grauel, said Bierk, was "tremendously stimulating and motivating, sometimes in very simple ways."

For example, Grauel would ask a student how many windows were in the Academic Hall dome. "Of course, it sounds like a silly question but his point was how little observant we are most of the time," said Bierk.

Grauel taught at Southeast from 1928 to 1971, and handled a number of academic duties over the year from English department chairman to adviser of the student newspaper and the yearbook.

He was 27 when he began his teaching career at the university.

Grauel naturally stood out. For one thing, he was considerably younger than most of the faculty, said Bierk.

In the book, Grauel recalls sitting in the classroom on the first day of classes in fall 1928, pretending to be a student so he could hear what the students were saying about the new teacher.

The students were surprised when the "classmate" turned out to be their teacher. "Near the close of the period I asked for questions or comments. I got one response: I was told I talked too rapidly for them to take notes."

In one essay Grauel recalls writing a university fight song for the dedication of Houck Stadium in October 1930.

He also recounted an incident at the Oct. 24, 1930, homecoming football game when first-team players on the Southeast squad were barred from entering the stadium because they didn't have their college registration cards with them. They were finally admitted and entered the game in the middle of the third quarter.

Another essay recalls Grauel's efforts to get rid of a bad case of dandruff. A concoction, mixed together by Grauel and another man, turned Grauel's black hair to a reddish color and later to an orange shade.

Grauel wrote that he had to live with the problem for 10 months, from March 1932 to January 1933, when his hair color returned to normal.

He recalled the episode was one of embarrassment. At one football game someone in the crowd yelled, "Sit down pumpkin head."

He remembered, "Even city papers found my embarrassment newsworthy, the April 21 issue of the Cape News carrying this item: `Just where the fad among college profs began is a dark mystery....A dark red mystery! But have you noticed what vast change dark auburn can bring to those who have habitually been brunette?'"

The book also recounts the lifting of the ban on dancing at Southeast in 1932.

Grauel was present at a meeting in September 1932 when President Joseph Serena decided to lift the ban because "dancing parties" were occurring secretly off campus.

The first campus dance was held the evening of Nov. 1, 1932, at the Training School. There were 196 people in attendance, including Grauel and 35 other faculty members.

The university's dance committee, which included Grauel, met on Nov. 3 to review what had occurred. "(Speech professor) Forrest Rose spoke up first, saying that college girls should be taught how to dress, especially they should be informed of the need to wear girdles and to refrain from choosing gowns which are too low-necked or backless.

"Dean (Kathleen) Gillard then admonished the other members of the committee for `falling down' on their jobs as chaperons and spending entirely too much time `enjoying' themselves.

"In rebuttal to criticism concerning the low-necked and backless gowns worn by some at the dance, I observed that gowns at a dance are not the same as dresses worn in a classroom, and that dress styles simply reflect the times.

"Although no one responded to my defense of low-necked and low-backed dresses, student and faculty committee members alike voiced their amazement at the number of times I was found on the dance floor, each time with a different woman.

"Such is the history of the beginning of dancing on the campus of Southeast Missouri State Teachers College," the essay notes.

"To have won this right may now seem a very trivial matter. It wasn't so in 1932."

Grauel said students had been fighting to have the ban lifted for decades. The event, he wrote, was significant because "dancing finally came out of the dark on the campus of Southeast Missouri State Teachers College, and with its entrance, the entire atmosphere at the college became more enlightened."