MATA McGUIRE January 23, 1996 Mame Warren, interviewer Warren: This is Mame Warren. Today is January 23, 1996. I'm in Glasgow, Virginia, with Mata McGuire. I've known Mata a long time, because Mata was the proprietor of the famous White Column Inn when I first arrived in Lexington. A lot of people have a lot of good feelings about that place. Tell me what your memories of the White Column Inn are. McGuire: Oh, the White Column. I thought we were going to talk abut Washington and Lee. Warren: We'll get to that, but I want to talk about the White Column, because the White Column was an important place for Washington and Lee people. McGuire: Well, that's true, I guess. We had a lot of fun there. We did have a lot of fun there, a lot more fun than this one. Everybody was young then, Mame. That's one of the best things about it, I guess, and everybody was smart, everybody was full of pep. Boy, I mean, there was a lot of energy there, and we had good food, good fun, good music, and people liked hanging out there. That was great, because I liked having people hang out. Warren: Tell me what kind of people hung out there. McGuire: Oh, God, an incredible assortment of folks. [Laughter] The derelicts didn't feel too bad about coming in at any moment. We had professors, we had students. Actually, we had more non-students than students. It was usually the maverick students that came in, you know, the maverick law students, the maverick undergrads. Of course, when we started that place, the undergraduate student body was less conservative, shall we say, than it is at the moment. Warren: When did you start the White Column Inn? McGuire: '74, I think it was. John Lanier and I bought the place--bought it, we didn't buy it. We started leasing it, I think it was in October '73. It took us from October to January to get it the way we wanted it. We fussed over that place. We did fuss a lot. Paul Buskey and Jane and Wayne Killy, I mean, we worked our buns off getting that place together. Anyway, I think it was 1 '74 in January when we opened, which was a good time in Lexington. It was a good time at W&L. All that peace, love, and everything else th3:t happened in the sixties everywhere else took a while to get here, you know. [Laughter] Warren: Tell me what you mean, that it was a good time. McGuire: Well, the town was more laid back. It was possible to have a good time, you know. The way things are right now, it's almost against the law to have a good time in Lexington, if a person's around and you look cross-eyed, somebody wants you to go away. Everybody was pretty laid back at that time. We wouldn't mind having long-haired weirdoes wandering into town with guitars and banjoes on their backs. I had good help. I had wonderful people working for me. It was a great place to find good help, because you've got law wives, you know, who are intelligent and attractive and energetic. We had a lot of fun. Downtown was alive in those days, too. It was an actual functioning town. You could buy a pair of shoes. There was even a grocery store on Main Street back in those days. It was an A&P store, I think, was still on Main Street, where the White Front is now. I guess you'd call White Front a grocery store. [Laughter] I probably shouldn't say that. No, it really was, it was a functional little small town. It was a nice little town with all kinds of real functional practical shops, a good hardware store. I loved that old hardware store with the wood floors and the little bins full of stuff. They didn't have anything in hermetically sealed packages. You could get six screws if you wanted them, or three. And walking up to the bank was an experience. You never could get from the White Column to the bank in less than half an hour or forty-five minutes, because you ran into everybody you knew, and you had to stop and chat. You always knew everything that was going on. That was a great thing. [Laughter] I miss that. People would come in off the highway and stay for three or four days because they had such a good time. What was--oh, Steve. What the heck was his last name? His car broke down and he stayed, got married, raised a family. [Laughter] It was like, "Oh, this is as good a place as any to stop." 2 Warren: There were a lot of people like that. McGuire: There were a lot of people like that, who sort of wandered in. Warren: I was talking to Siggy Podaleski [phonetic]. He said having lunch with you got him to stay. McGuire: Oh, dear. I knew from the very first day that we opened and somebody called up on the telephone, I think it was probably one of our very first telephone calls in, and they said, "Is there anybody there that wants to help move a piano?" I said, "I think we're in." [Laughter] You know? People used to get calls from their dentist, "Tell so and so he's got an appointment at three o'clock, and if he doesn't get over here, we're going to cancel it." Stuff like that. Back when Ken Harris was still being a lawyer, he used to do most of his business in our dining room. Yeah, we had a good time. Had some great music, everything in the world. Warren: Tell me about the music. McGuire: Well, you know, a lot of the old-timers that used to play there have settled in. Andy and Tony Williams and David and Mary Winston are out here on Plank Road running the greenhouse now, raising a family. James Leva is here. A lot of them that just stayed. It all started because the old-timers used to hang out and they'd just sit around and jam, you know, and people liked to listen, so it just sort of grew from there. Warren: For future generations, define old-timers. McGuire: Oh, well, you know-- Warren: That means something different when we're talking about music, I think. McGuire: Oh, yeah. The old-time scene is--1 mean, lots of people confuse it with blue grass, but, of course, it hasn't anything really to do with that and it goes way back before. It's old-time banjo and fiddle music, basically banjo and fiddle, you know, and guitars thrown in. Now there's some pretty good mandolin players playing old-time. A lot of it goes back to Scotch-Irish music that came over. It's got a lot of black in it, got a lot of black influence in it. Odell [McGuire] is the one you want to talk to about that. He's going to write the definitive history of old-time music in 3 Rockbridge County some day, now that he's got his computer. He's online now, you know, and he has his home page and he has an old-time section. It's even got music. Warren: I haven't checked out his home page. McGuire: You should definitely check it out. Warren: I will plug in. McGuire: That all started before the restaurant, though. That started in the sixties. I'm trying to think what year it was Odell and I went to Galax for the first time. I mean, real middle-class: we stayed in a motel. Hee hee. And there wasn't a whole lot of old-time music at that time either. There were some real old fellows that played like fretless banjoes and stuff like that, but it was mostly blue grass. Old-time [music] picked up through the sixties and a lot of younger people started playing it, then went and hunted out the old. We were part of that. We went and hunted out all these old fellows up in the hills and what have you, and went to the fiddle festivals that really had old-time music. We had what we called the Hoard, Odell and his Hoard of Mongrels, and they sort of hung out at our house. Everybody always said, "What do you play?" I said, "I play the frying pan. That's what I play." Kind of started out with Scott Ainsley. Have you heard Scott's new stuff? He is one of the very few of the old-timers who has actually made music his complete living. He's got a CD out now called "Jealous of the Moon." It's really good. He does a thing about blues. He did it over at Lee Chapel two or three years ago. Man, he's good. He's researched the history, he's written a book. He's good. I always admired Scott. He stuck to his ideals, you know. He's still got all that idealism that was twenty years ago. Anyway, he and Kelly Blake [phonetic] and Chris Murray [phonetic], Al Tharp, some of the beginners, the ones that started out--the World's Ugliest Old-time Band. [Laughter] Warren: Where did Plank Road come in? McGuire: That was later. Unidentified: Are you housemother talking? McGuire: No, we're talking about old music, mainly. 4 Odell's got the chronology better than I do. I'm trying to think when James came back to school, James Leva and Andy Williams and Michael James Kott. Had a whole bunch came. That was after the Column started, the Plank Road bunch. Warren: One thing that impressed me when I first moved to Lexington, to Rockbridge County, was how well educated the carpenters are. McGuire: Oh, God, yeah. Everybody's over-educated. This is one of the biggest egghead counties in the world, I think. Over on the other side; not over here. No, that's the truth. Everybody that came to fix your faucets or anything else, you know, was going to W&L or something similar. Warren: What is it about this place that makes people not leave? They come here and they don't go away. McGuire: Well, it's beautiful, for one thing. When we came here, the thing that I liked about it was it was about thirty years behind the rest of the world. Unfortunately, it's catching up. But I don't think people realize that that's one of the most attractive things about this place, from a kinder, gentler time. It's beautiful. Of course, it's very attractive to be surrounded by intelligent people. If you're an intelligent person and you come and you find intelligent people wherever you go, it's very nice. It's very nice and comforting. Back then, you were allowed to let your imagination run wild. I mean, we did things like have the world's most monstrous croquet party. Bob Carrere who graduated from W&L, used to do some theater, and started teaching at the high school, he was just wonderful. He was a wonderful guy. Warren: Who was this? McGuire: Bob Carrere. He had a place out on the river. I wonder what year that was. I can't even remember what year that was. Just before the Column. Probably '72, '73, something like that. We had this monstrous croquet party out there, and everybody wore costumes. Must have been two hundred people out there. We had strawberries and champagne. I mean, it was wild. I wish I knew where the pictures were. There were some incredible pictures. 5 Warren: Who took those pictures? McGuire: Carter Redd was there. Oh, my God, there were all kinds of--who took those pictures? I have no idea who took those pictures. I bet Doug would know. Warren: Doug Harwood? McGuire: Oh, God, yes, I'm sure. Warren: Was he there? McGuire: Of course. I'll tell you, Suzanne Gerard was there, who's now Susan Noonan and who's back. "Little Blue Eyes," we used to call her. Oh, that was quite a party. That was quite a party. VMI cadets came by in canoes and saw this zoo going on. We all ran down and gave them cups full of strawberries and champagne, and they paddled on up the river, you know, and by the time they came back, everybody was naked and in the water. [Laughter] That happened in those days. Nobody could do that anymore. Of course, most of us don't take our clothes off in public anymore, either. [Laughter] Oh, me. Yeah, well, there was a lot of imagination around in those days. A lot of imagination. Warren: So you think that's over with now? McGuire: Well, I don't see the younger generation doing anything like that. I don't know what they do. Smoke dope now? I don't think they have as much fun as we did. We did. We had some of the wildest Halloween parties. I don't know, that crowd always liked to get dressed up. There were a lot of actors. I mean, there may not have been professional actors, but there were a lot of people who didn't mind being in some-other character sometimes. We used to have some wild parties. But, you know, they were fun parties. They weren't--! don't know. Anyway, they seemed like good fun. Warren: So what do you think has changed? Why do you think it isn't that way anymore? McGuire: Well, you know, there was quite a generation non-gap at that time. Odell and I were a lot older than some of those kids, and there were people older than us that used to go to our parties. It didn't seem to bother anybody. People would bring their kids. It sort of spanned the generations. I think now they close themselves off. I don't think the generations interact as much 6 as they used to somehow. Maybe Odell and I were just childish. [Laughter] This is a distinct possibility. Oh, me. Everybody's kind of uptight anymore, don't seem to have as much fun. Of course, I'll tell you something. Back then, you could get along on one person's salary. Everybody wasn't working all the time, falling over themselves trying to make a living and support their families . It didn't take two people to do it then. God knows, college professors don't make a lot of money, but it was enough to live on back then. But I don't know any faculty families that the wife doesn't work anymore. Warren: You came here as a faculty wife. Where did you come from? McGuire: I met Odell at Columbia. I was an undergraduate. He was my mineralogy instructor, and he was working on his master's. We eloped and went to Alberta for three years, and then we went to Illinois where he got his Ph.D., then we came here in '61. Some of his students were older than I was, the seniors, anyway. I was a child bride. Warren: So you came in 1961. McGuire: Yes. Warren: Describe what Lexington was like when you first arrived. McGuire: Well, I thought VMI was the state prison. I said, "Odell, you didn't tell me there was a state prison here." [Laughter] Oh, me. Washington and Lee was a neat place. I was so green, I guess, but I came here and I thought Washington and Lee was without a doubt the epitome of what a university should be. I went to Barnard and Columbia, you know, in the heart of New York City, and this place, it stole my heart. I thought it was just wonderful, and there were all these dear old professors, you know, noblesse oblige, the dollar-a-year men that taught because they thought they owed it to the next generation. God, they were wonderful. And Odell and I came just as that generation was turning over, and then there were all the young ones-that are now retiring, of course--coming in. There was only one problem: we had to support families. There was a little period of adjustment there when the university had to realize that they had to pay them enough to live on 7 instead of just these people who taught because they loved it and didn't really need the money. That was kind of fun. But I thought it was just the most wonderful place. The students interact with the faculty, you know. There was so much rapport and so much interaction. Professors invited their students home for dinner and people would stop you on the street and talk to you. Lexington is still a very friendly place, but it was incredible back then. Students still had the speaking tradition. That was back when they wore coats and ties, too, and all that stuff. Warren: Describe the speaking tradition to me. McGuire: If you walked across campus, it didn't matter if you were a tourist or a townie or a faculty wife or whatever, everybody said, "How do you do," or, "Hello," or nodded, at least, smiled. It just happened. I mean, that was the way it had always been and it carried over into the town. The honor code at VMI and at Washington and Lee and the high school sort of permeated the whole--1 mean, you could drop your wallet on Main Street and somebody would bring it back. It was a marvelous place to be in those days. You never locked anything. Of course, I still don't lock anything. Now you feel like you ought to. It was pretty, a pretty town. Of course, I'm a Yankee. I'm a Yankee, was a Yankee. When I came here, I was quite a Yankee. I thought all these dear old ladies were just the most wonderful, scrumptious things. They were so genteel, so polite, and so charming. They were all very nice to this child bride that Odell dragged down here. And I loved that school. Boy, I sure thought the world of that place. I thought the professors were the most wonderful. I had one professor at Barnard who would have been perfect here. He would have been just absolutely at home at Washington and Lee, but they were just so cozy. It was a cozy place, a very cozy place. Warren: Tell me about that role as a faculty wife. What were you expected to do? McGuire: I don't know, because I never did it. [Laughter] You went to the receptions and all of that sort of thing. Actually there wasn't a whole lot expected of you. I guess if you wanted to be a social climber or something, if I'd done more research--! didn't do any research. But everybody was always very nice to me and I didn't feel like I wasn't holding up my end of the stick or 8 something, but then again, Odell, as soon as he got tenure, never wore a suit again the whole time he taught there, so I think we were a little bit out of step with the rest of the gang, anyway. I used to go to faculty cocktail parties and receptions and things and stand next to Sam Kozak because he used to make some of the funniest comments. I loved his dry sense of humor. The rest of it was mostly deja vu. I wasn't a very good faculty wife. I liked working in the geology department. Warren: What did you do there? McGuire: I was Ed's secretary, Ed Spencer's secretary. It was fun. We had great geology majors in those days, too. It was a hot department. It always was. It's a great department, lots of balance. It was a good balance in that department. Ed was a tremendous administrator and he wrote books, and he was just the dearest man to work for. Sam was the machine man; I mean, he always had his wish list. The department was extremely well equipped for a little bitty school, you know. Warren: What's Sam? McGuire: Sam Kozak. Odell was kind of the recruiter. They got more majors out of Odell's classes, despite his being such a strange old fart. Warren: Say that a little louder: old fart. [Laughter] I mean, that's self-censoring here. McGuire: [Laughter] When Fred came, of course, Fred Schwab, he's a hot shot, let's face it. He goes all over the world making speeches and everything else, but he's so funny. The students think he's so funny . I suspect he makes geology more amusing than anybody. He's the funniest guy. But it was a real well-rounded department. Fred published enough for the ones that didn't want to. Odell never got anything done except his maps, but he was a good teacher. He was a real good teacher. It was a comfortable little department. It was a lot of fun. I don't think anybody ever was all that uptight with each other, you know. There was always a lot of internecine fighting amongst big departments, but there never seemed to be any problem that way with the geologists. I suppose they got mad at each other occasionally, but didn't really amount to anything. It was a very well-run department. Then Frank Young--when did Frank graduate? Frank graduated in the sixties and then he went to law school, and then he inherited his dad's oil company, and he was the 9 benefactor. He was also on the board of trustees. I know he died very young. So sad. I liked Frank a lot. Warren: I don't know Frank Young. McGuire: He was from down in Fort Worth, a real nice guy. Warren: And he was a benefactor to the university? McGuire: To the geology department, in fact. I remember when he first--he gave something. First he gave the department an airplane. They could sell the airplane and have the money for it. Then he gave them a chunk of money. When he did that, he wrote a letter to--I think it might have been Bob Huntley, who was president then, but anyway, he wrote a letter and he said, "This money is for the geology department, and if I see any reduction in their normal budget, this will be the last gift you ever get." [Laughter] He was like that, Frank. Warren: How much did you see things change from administration to administration? You've been around for several administrations now. McGuire: Yeah. Yeah, we were here for Dr. Cole. I really had hopes. I really don't have anything against [John W.] Elrod. He's a nice man, but really had hopes that they'd put an alum in this time, because I think--man, I think they got so far away from what this school used to be during [John] Wilson's administration. Granted, the times are moving on, but when Odell and I came here in '61, there were about twelve people ran this university. They didn't have computers or anything else, you know, and once you learned those twelve people, you could get anything done you needed to get done. There were the Mohlers. Oh, wasn't that awful about George Mohler's fire? Did you hear about that? That was so sad. Anyway, there was Mr. Coleman, who ran the library, and there was Mrs. McClung, who ran the registrar's office. If a student had a conflict or something, he'd run into the registrar's office and he'd say, "Mrs. McClung, I need to take Dr. so and so's course at such and such a time. It's in conflict with so and so." She'd say, "Go have your lunch," and he'd come back and she'd have fixed it. That's just the way it worked. And all the administrators taught. They had to teach at least one course, and even the president taught something back in those days. It makes you 10 remember the reason that the university is there is because you're supposed to teach students, not pile papers. But we're topheavy with administrators over there now. I mean, secretaries have secretaries. We were at a party someplace, and Ed Atwood and June, his wife, was there, and Julia Kozak and Sam, and I don't know, a whole bunch of other people, but we were all sitting around talking, and somebody said something and Ed Atwood said something, and Julia Kozak turned around to him and said, "Oh, Ed, you're just a one-door dean." [Laughter] Back in those days, that made a difference, because deans did things. Warren: What did deans do? McGuire: I suspect they took care of a great deal of the stuff that doesn't get done now by all of these administrators. What was it, Dean Gilliam used to do all the recruiting. Even after he retired, I think he did, or he did a whole lot of it, anyway. A lot of it was just done by the network, the old-boy network. I swear we got better students. I don't know what's happened in the last few years. When I started the Phi Delta, the class that I moved into the new fraternity house with were just sweet as they could be. They were the nicest bunch of boys, all Deep South boys. As long as they were there, until they graduated, the house was under control pretty much, and it worked the way it was supposed to. If I had any problem, I went to my officers and they took care of it. If they couldn't take care of it, they talked to the house corps and they took care of it. Everything worked very nicely. That went to hell in a bushel basket. I don't know what happened, but the students that we got in the house and the students that other people were talking about in other houses, they just got all out of hand. What I said was the first batch had parents. I met their parents. Their parents cared. Their parents came. They obviously lived with their parents, they'd eat with their parents, like normal families. Then all of a sudden I got a batch that were hatched, and I don't think they ever ate meals with their parents and I don't think--I don't know. Warren: What time period are you talking about? McGuire: Just before I quit over there. 11 Warren: When? Give me a year. McGuire: Well, I'm here two years now. '91, '92, in there. Warren: And before that, you were with Z--- McGuire: Yes, I had ZBT way back. Warren: When is way back? McGuire: After I closed the Columns. '83, '84. I was over there for five or six years. I loved those guys [at ZBT]. Man, they were the funniest bunch of little misfits and smart, and they have all grown up to be such wonderful people. They came back, I had thirteen of them here for New Year's. They stayed in the motel, and we were living in the Presbyterian Manse over here, Ann and I and I, and they came for New Year's with wives and babies and sweethearts and everything. I got a card the other day from Will Barber, he's in Prague teaching. Warren: Frank asked me to ask you about your experience with the ZBTs. McGuire: Oh, God, I loved those kids. Warren: He says that at some point it was primarily a Jewish house. McGuire: Listen. There used to be three Jewish houses on campus. Warren: Tell me about that. McGuire: Well, before the academics began to fall off, there was a big Jewish population at W&L. There was ZBT, there was Sammys, and there were the Peeps. The Peeps were where the KA House is now, and I can't remember where the Sammys were. They weren't here all that long. They had a real good pre-med program here. Dr. Starling's pre-med program attracted a lot of Jewish boys. I went to school with Jewish kids in New York City, you know, and they are very much into good academics, the prestige of good academics, and when the prestige from the academics start to fall off, they're not going to send their kids anymore. You can't blame them. Actually, the end of ZBT was just about when academics bottomed out here. Really, that was kind of the low point, just before they went coed, because they were scraping. They were really scraping. But those Zs, they were so sweet. Most of them were poor. Most of them didn't have much money, and they were so bright. They were definitely misfits. They were not your general 12 run-of-the-mill fraternity boys. Most of them lived in the house for three years and they treated it like a home, and when they did the survey for the renovations, that house required less money to be put into it than any house on campus because they hadn't trashed it. Warren: That's what Frank was telling me. McGuire: They hadn't trashed it, because they loved it, they lived in it, it was their home for at least three years. Some stayed longer. It wasn't long toward the end, there weren't that many of them. But, oh, God, they were a wonderful bunch of kids. I loved them and I still love them because they still come back. I had a much better rapport with them than with the Phi Delts. Warren: So that fraternity actually closed down at Washington and Lee? McGuire: Yes, yes, they just faded away. Warren: That was while you were there, it faded away? McGuire: Yes, just shortly after. I kept them going a lot longer than they probably could have. When I took over over there, oh, man, they'd gotten themselves into a terrible pickle with bills, because they were buying their groceries at the grocery store instead of doing anything wholesale and everything, so I fed them on about half their budget the first year I was there so I could pay off their bills. [Laughter] They all learned a lot. Taught a lot of them how to cook, too. Warren: You taught them how to cook? McGuire: Yeah. I almost wrote a cookbook for them. Well, I mimeographed a lot of it for them, and I never did get it all together in book form. You know, how to make gravy without lumps, stuff like that. Warren: And the guys actually came into the kitchen? McGuire: Oh, gosh, they hung out there all the time. We had a grand time. Warren: Tell me about that. McGuire: Well, when I closed the White Column, Mollie Messimer said, "Mata, you know, you really ought to go over to JMU and get your counseling degree," and I said, "Mollie, I know myself pretty well, and if I go over there and I find a professor that I really admire and respect, I'll become a disciple and I'll lose all my instincts. If I don't find anybody that I feel like that about, 13 I'll probably open my mouth and get thrown out. And besides, who's going to go to a counselor that has to chop carrots while they're talking to you?" [Laughter] Because this is the way it always is. Warren: I would. McGuire: It was that way at the Columns. People would come out in the kitchen and tell me their problems. "Here, chop carrots. It's good for you." And the same way at ZBT. Let's face it. They were sort of a funny little bunch, dear, dear children, but they were misfits and they didn't have a whole lot of luck with girls. I remember one of the first things they said to me was, "How do we get girls to come here?" I said, "Clean the bathrooms." I had enough of them coming into the White Column to use the bathroom because they wouldn't use the bathroom at any of the fraternities. I said, "Clean bathrooms." And it worked. They didn't stay long, but they did come. [Laughter] Then the smart ones stayed, and we had a lot of really nice girls that could see beyond the fact that they didn't have any money and they were not die-stamped out of the same mold that everybody else was. A lot of them have managed to find lovely little ladies to marry, who appreciate the finer qualities. Warren: So did you get recruited to be a house mother? How did it come to be that you became a house mother? McGuire: Joe Goldsten, when they needed a house mother at Phi Delt after the renovations, my daughter-in-law, Jenny, saw this as in the paper and she called, and it was Joe Goldsten, and he said, "Oh, well, it wouldn't work for you, because you have a family and you'd want to live at home, but have your mother-in-law call me." [Laughter] I called and said, "What's up, Joe?" Of course, I'd known Joe forever and all this kids and Addie, his daughter, used to work for me at the Column. Joe liked the old-time music, too. He says, "We need a house mother like you." I said, "A house mother. Hmm. I don't know whether I'm going to like this or not." He says, "Well, you can try it." 14 I said, "Well, I've tried everything else. I might as well." So that's how I got into the house mothering business at Phi Delt. Joe retired the same time I quit. Warren: You went to Phi Delt first or ZBT first? McGuire: ZBT was way back in the eighties. Warren: So then there was a period you weren't a house mother? McGuire: Oh, yeah. I wasn't really a house mother at ZBT. I was their mother. I was their cook and their mother and their overseer and everything else, but I wasn't a house mother. Warren: This wasn't an official position? McGuire: They didn't have house mothers at that time. That was before the renovations. Warren: But they used to have house mothers. McGuire: Uh-huh. I think that Laura Fletcher, who was the ZBT house mother, was one of the very last to go. I think she was there until maybe '70, '73, maybe. Warren: Were you paid to be doing what you were doing at ZBT? McGuire: I was paid like a cook or whatever. I mean, actually, you know, cooks get paid better. Most cooks get paid better than house mothers. Did you know that? Warren: No. McGuire: My son's a cook at PKA. Makes a hell of a lot more than I did. [Laughter] Warren: So there was a period after ZBT. Then what did you do? McGuire: Stuff. I worked for a couple of CIA chefs out at Ramada Inn for a while. Did different things for a while, nothing very spectacular. I liked working with those CIA chefs. Man, they are good. Warren: They know their stuff, huh? McGuire: You can learn a lot just watching those people. Warren: I actually went up there one time and had lunch there. It was very impressive. McGuire: Jesse wants to go. He's decided to go. Warren: So you got recruited for Phi Delt. This was right after the renaissance program was under way? 15 McGuire: Yes. Warren: So you were sort of part of that? McGuire: Uh-huh. Warren: Can you describe the fraternity renaissance program from your point of view? McGuire: Well, of course, most of it was done by the time I got involved in it. I'll tell you one thing, that architect was an idiot, and they should have got somebody. They should have got somebody from the university to ride herd on that bunch. They got ripped off big time. Man, did they get ripped off big time. Warren: How so? McGuire: Well, Doug Harwood said, "You know that great big expensive brick wall in the back of the gym, it's got nothing, no windows, no nothing? They ought to paint a great big tit on there, because that's what everything thinks Washington and Lee is, it's a great big tit." My personal experience with the interior decorator that they fired, finally, she was ripping them off big time, evidently, and the people she was working for, too, I guess. They would have had, I think, a lot better luck had they let the students have a little more say in what kind of decorations they put in the house, what kind of furniture and what have you. I think they did a pretty good job of the room furniture for the student rooms upstairs, but I'll tell you, some of the furniture they put in the living rooms was pretty darn silly for students. Warren: What do you mean? What kind of things? McGuire: I mean, you know, little love seats for boys. I had a stupid little couch in the living room at Phi Delt, and I had two 6'9" basketball players and one of them would fill this stupid thing, you know. Well, they've had it reupholstered at least once. They don't stand up under the kind of wear that students give. Warren: Did your opinion get asked? McGuire: By the time I got on board there, most of that stuff was already wished on us. I did manage to talk them into putting in a laundry in the basement. The architect was such a fool, he didn't remember that there was duct work going up, so the measurements we gave him for two 16 washing machines and two dryers weren't right, because the room wasn't the right size, because there was this large duct thing in the corner room. He didn't know anything about electricity, because they were underpowered. You could not use both dryers at the same time. They had to have the electrician come in and rewire. I mean, there were so many things like that. The man drew pretty pictures. That was it. I mean, he did lovely renderings of what these things were going to look like, but I don't think he knew a damn thing about practical reality, you know--electrical, plumbing, heating, air-conditioning, leakage, gutters. Gutters. Instead of getting the already baked-on enamel gutters, they got plain old gutters and then they painted them and the paint peeled off, and they got the worst painters. Man, I mean to tell you they had some of the worst painters. There was just an awful lot of that. They should have got Pat Brady to come in and supervise that whole thing. I know he loves the university, he probably would have done it for little or nothing, just come kick ass, make sure that they were doing what they were supposed to do. Warren: Let me turn the tape over.