CHARLES "MURPH" MURRAY May 14, 1997 — Mame Warren, interviewer Warren: This is Mame Warren. It's the fourteenth of May 1997. I'm in Lexington, Virginia, with Charles Murray, but no one ever calls you Charles Murray. Murray: No, they call me "Murph." Warren: Why? I want to know how Charles Murray became "Murph." Murray: Years ago when Bob McHenry was here, Bill McHenry's younger brother, coaching basketball and lacrosse, he just started to call me that, and it stuck with me ever since. Warren: When would that have been? Murray: 1960. Warren: So when you were hired, you were not Murph. Murray: No, I wasn't. Warren: How did you come to be hired at Washington and Lee? Murray: Well, a lot of people got to complaining about the students having their parties and all kinds of noise, and the school decided to have a proctor. Dean Gilliam was dean of students at the time, and he said, "I am too old to run around here at night, so let's hire somebody else." So in 1959, they hired me. Warren: What was Dean Gilliam like? What had he done before, and how did you take over from him? Murray: I didn't take over from him. He was still Dean of Students. I worked under him. He was one wonderful man. Warren: Tell me about him. 1 Murray: He was the type of man that you couldn't say no to. He used to have these big flower garden shows at his house where he lived on the top of the hill over here. At that time I was a police officer. He always called me and wanted to know if I wanted to handle his parking and stuff for him, so I did. So when this job came up, I applied for it and he highly recommended me and so did Dr. Griffith, who was in charge of the committee to try to find someone. Warren: So you had been with the Lexington Police Department? Murray: Yes. Warren: So you'd been on the other side watching the students. Murray: Yes. So in January of 1959, I went to work. Of all times, that's the time that they held Fancy Dress in January. They'd go home for Christmas, come back and take their exams, then have Fancy Dress. Sometimes there would be a foot and a half of snow on the ground. Warren: What did that mean in terms of Fancy Dress? Murray: Well, they went on and had it, but I had to get around the best way I could. Warren: What would you be doing during Fancy Dress? Murray: Well, stay outside over there and try to keep things quiet. After the dance was over, I'd patrol around the fraternity houses and see if everything was quiet. At that time the school had some right tight rules. Girls were not allowed in the dormitories. They had rules that on big weekends the girls could stay in the fraternity houses 'til two o'clock at night, and on a big night they could stay in there 'til three o'clock, but any other times on a normal weekend they had to be out of the house by one o'clock. And it was my job to see that it was done. Warren: How did you do that? Murray: I'd just drive up in front of the fraternity houses and look around, this, that, and the other, and see what's going on. If I thought some girls were in the house, I'd go in and get rid of them. 2 Warren: How did you do that? Murray: Just walked in the house and told them they had to leave. Warren: Were there ever any problems? Murray: I didn't have too much problem with them. The whole time I worked here, the thirty-some years I worked here, I never had any problems with the students at all. I got along with them well. Warren: It sure seems to me, from what I hear on the other side, that you got along with them well. Murray: I did. I did real well. Instead of trying to hinder them, I tried to help them. I tried to prevent trouble before it got started. Warren: That's what I've heard and that's what I'd really like to hear your side of the story, because one of the things that people who talk about you, what they say is, "He was always there," and they thought you were God. They thought you were omnipresent. How did you know where to be? Murray: I don't know. Just luck, I guess. Police experience, I imagine. I just always happened to show up either before it happened or right just as soon as it was getting ready to happen. Warren: So what would you do if you saw something about to happen? Murray: I'd get out and tell them they'd have to knock it off and get back in the fraternity house and be quiet. Warren: There must have been more to it than that. Murray: Well, I don't know. I was just lucky. Just like I said, I tried to help them any way I could instead of hinder them. As long as they listened to me and did what I told them to do, there wasn't any problem. And they generally did what I told them. Warren: This is a pretty big campus. Murray: And I was by myself at the time. Warren: That's what my next question was. How long were you by yourself? 3 Murray: There was one night watchman at that time. In the summertime when he took off, I had to come over here at night and do what he did. Warren: So you were here day and night? Murray: Yes. I put in as many hours as eighteen, nineteen hours a day. And on weekends, I'd leave the house, on Saturday night especially, I'd leave the house about nine o'clock at night, and sometimes it was four-thirty or five before I came home, after being up all day fooling with football games and stuff like that. Warren: How did you do that? Murray: I don't know. I just did it. I stayed in pretty good shape. I played handball five days a week when I had a chance. I stayed in pretty good shape. Warren: I can tell you that you are a much beloved personality on this campus through many generations, and I've had more than one person tell me that you saved him from doing something that he would have really regretted doing. Murray: I did. I used to keep them out of trouble. I have gone to jail and got them out of jail when they'd get locked up for something. Warren: I'm not asking for names, but I'm asking for stories. Can you tell me about something like that, something that happened that would have caused— Murray: To go to jail? Warren: Yes. Murray: Well, one night a boy, it was a football player, he broke an antenna off a car, and it turned out to be an F.B.I. car. I happened to know the man, so I went to him and talked to him and said, "If I get a replacement fixed like it should be, would you charge him with anything?" He said, "No, just take care of it," and I did. Warren: What was an F.B.I. car doing here? Murray: I don't know. They're always around. I remember one night years ago, back in the early sixties over where we had the old railroad station, that Washington and Lee owns is now, they used to run the Greyhound bus over there. I happened to be up. It 4 must have been about one o'clock in the morning, and I was getting dressed. I could hear it all the way out to my house. About the time the telephone rang, and it was Dean Gilliam. He said, "Will you go over and take care of that? I'm too old to be going over there." I said, "I'm on my way now, Dean." I said, "I hear them from here." So instead of pulling up in the front where they could see me, I parked my car in behind the old railroad station on the other side and got out and went through the back door. There was a black boy on this bus, and the students were rocking the bus. His eyes had gotten real big. I really thought they was after him. So I just reached over in the glove compartment of my car and got a pencil and a piece of paper, walked out in the crowd, stood there looking around, like I was writing names down, which I wasn't. In about five minutes, I was standing there by myself, didn't write a name. So they all come back up on the Hill. Warren: Yes, I heard subtlety is your trade. Murray: Several other times, one night when a certain fraternity house had a bunch of girls up there, which is James Madison Women's College, at the time, I reckon that's what they called it, and they had had a sorority up here. One of the football players was in the front yard. He was behind some bushes. I come down the street and I saw all these young ladies going up there toward this fraternity house, and I just told them, I was hollering, I said, "You can't do that, young ladies. You've got to get out of here." One of the guys up there behind the bush hollers, "Doesn't that damn guy ever go to bed?" [Laughter] I tell you, there's some right good stories. One time I got, I think you know this one, but at twelve o'clock at night I was messing around, that's when they had a lot more bushes over here around the freshmen dorm than they have now, and a bunch of upperclassmen were trying to get these kids to go to Southern Seminary for a panty raid. So I just didn't say a word, just got in my car and drove up to Buena Vista and alerted the security that they were coming. About three hundred of them come up over that hill there, down below there, they parked all 5 down there, and as they come up over the hill, I stepped underneath the streetlight where they could see me. Now, I knew this one boy Lee, he looked up and he saw me, and he said, "Where in the hell did you come from?" I said, "The best thing that you can do is get back home," so they did. Warren: What year would that have been? Murray: It was in the sixties. Warren: They were still doing panty raids in the sixties? Murray: Yeah. Warren: How long did that kind of thing go on? Murray: That time we only had one try at it. It didn't go on too much. Warren: Boy, I'll bet the people at Southern Sem were grateful for you. Murray: Yeah, they were waiting on them. This one boy was a policeman I knew over there real well, he said, "Bob, I'm going around behind the dormitory and see if any of them got around there." He went around there where the girls were looking out the windows, and one of them hollered, "Take that uniform off and come on in here." [Laughter] Oh, boy, I'll tell you, had some times. I was trying to think of another story this morning. I can't quite think of any right now. Maybe it'll come back to me a little later. Just can't quite think of it. I had so many of them. I can't think of it right now. Warren: It'll come to you. You were here at an interesting time. Did you grow up in Lexington? Murray: I was born here in Lexington. My mother passed away when I was ten years old, and my father moved back to Lynchburg, where he came from, and I finished high school over there. Right after I got out of high school, the Second World War come along, and I ended up in the Marine Corps. Warren: Then you came back to Lexington? 6 Murray: In 1946, as soon as I got out of the service. My grandma was still living, so I came back here and stayed with her. I had gotten married in 1945. Warren: So you've known Washington and Lee pretty much all your life. Murray: All my life, yes. Warren: But when you came in 1959, things were still probably pretty much as you'd known them, but things were starting to change. Murray: Every time I saw a bunch of students standing in front of the fraternity house toward the street, I'd say, "You have to go back inside with that alcohol," because the school's always known to drink, and they're going to keep on drinking. I was trying to think of something else. It just won't come to me. Warren: I'm sure it will come back as we keep talking. Murray: Maybe it will. Warren: So you came to work here in 1959. Murray: January 1959. Warren: But you had been a policeman in Lexington? Murray: Yes. Warren: One of the things that I've seen pictures of, but I don't know much about, is the parades they used to have through town with torches. Murray: When I was a kid they had them, and they used to meet over there in front of the gymnasium, that's when Cy Young was the alumni director, and they would all have pajamas on. They'd already paid to go to the movie, so all they had to is run in. So they would get the torches over there and light them, and march down Washington Street up to Main, and up Main down the theater. The city would put barrels of water. As each boy went by the barrel, they'd put the torch into it, and then they'd go on in the movie. This friend of mine, when I was little, they used to pick us up and carry us in with them, when I was little. Warren: Would they carry you in the parade? 7 Murray: Yeah, carry us into the movie and we'd watch the movie, and then they'd all come back to the dormitory. Warren: Did this happen very often? Murray: It happened a few times. Of course, after I got bigger—I was young then. After I got bigger, my father went back to Lynchburg and I didn't see it anymore. Warren: Then when you were a policeman, was it still going on then? Murray: No, they didn't do it then. They didn't have any parades then. Warren: So, 1959, the students are all still wearing coats and ties all the time. Murray: Yeah, and beanies. Warren: And freshman beanies. But during those first few years you were here, things started changing. Murray: In the sixties, they did away with the beanies, starting wearing name tags. Then they did away with the name tags and started dressing like they wanted to dress, long hair. Of course, that during the Vietnam War. Then one night we had a [unclear] got to acting up, running through the campus nude. They put something over their face so nobody would recognize them. This one boy, I knew he was an athlete, come running out there, he had something over his face, and I told him, "You better get some clothes on before I turn you in." The next day he said, "How'd you know it was me?" I said, "I just knew it." But he had something over his face, a hood like, where you couldn't tell who they were. [Laughter] They were having a good time. Just like I said, as long as they listened to me and did what I told them to do, there wasn't any problem. Warren: Did you find your job changing through the years as the times changed, or was the behavior of the students pretty constant? Murray: Well, they had their parties and did their drinking and carrying on. Then we got up to 1985, and it went coed and it calmed down a little bit. It's calmer now because we got more girls here. Warren: Tell me what you mean by that. Tell me what influence women have made. 8 Murray: I think the girls had something to do with it, that they calmed down. They wasn't running up and down the road three and four nights a week to Hollins and Sweet Briar when they had girls here they could date here. So that calmed them down some. But they still have a big time, I can tell you that. Warren: How would you define "big time" among the students? Murray: I mean big parties and having parties and carrying on and all that celebrating, especially during Pledge Week when the kids tear, they do a lot of shouting and carrying on. But it never bothered me, because if I thought it was serious enough, I would step in and do something about it. Nowadays I don't even know who's in the Rush Week this time at all. Of course, I wasn't there like I used to be. Warren: Did you get ever get involved in problems with hazing or anything like that? Murray: Well, I used to see them, especially this one fraternity, like I say, they was putting this stuff all over them and getting them pretty well drunked up, and they would come back to the dormitory and cause little problems, and I'd have to be there and do something with them. Warren: Oh, come on, you've got to tell me more than that. Murray: [Laughter] Oh, well, it didn't take long to calm them down. They'd always listen to me. They'd say, "Oh, come on, Murph." I'd say, "Listen, if you don't want to go see the man, you better do what I tell you to do." They'd say, "Okay." Warren: You're very persuasive. Murray: I got along with them real well. This past Alumni Weekend, I don't know how many hugs I got from guys from the class of '67 and things like that, '62. Friday night at the meal, this one boy, he's a local boy, but he's a lawyer in Lynchburg right now, comes in there with his hands full of food and stuff. He says, "I can't shake your hand now because my hands are full, so I'll just kiss you on the cheek." So he did. Warren: That's so sweet. That's really sweet. 9 Murray: There was this one boy I was looking for the whole time, during the class of '67 he was a football player, and he didn't come to any of the luncheons. So I asked one of the other football players, I said, "Where is he?" He said, "He went to Goshen today, he and his wife and a couple other football players," old football players. They went on down to the VMI game. Now, he didn't see me, but I saw him when he came in and sat down, so I walked down over there and was standing about as far as from here to that wall behind him. He didn't know I was back there. I said, "You finally decided to come out of hiding?" He said, "Murph." I said, "How'd you know it was me?" He said, "I know that voice." [Laughter] He come up and gave me a big hug. It's nice to have those kids come back and you see them. Every time one of them sees me, they say I haven't changed a bit, because they say I look the same as I was when they were here. But I know different. [Laughter] Warren: Well, they know what they know, too, though. That class of '67, '68 and '69— Murray: Buddy Atkins was '68. Warren: I presume, just like everywhere else in the world, drugs arrived at Washington and Lee. Murray: They what? Warren: Drugs were here on campus? Murray: Yeah, it was mainly marijuana, but they kept it quiet. They weren't open with it like people are nowadays. For a long time there on weekends, I was wondering why there wasn't too many parties going on around the fraternity houses, I think maybe they were off somewhere doing that, to where nobody could see them, except the ones that were using. Warren: Then from what I understand, that things changed a good bit in the seventies, too. 10 Murray: Yeah, some. They were a little calmer, and, of course, we had eighteen fraternity houses at the time, and I was around every one of them. Dean Gilliam told somebody one day he wished he had eighteen Bob Murrays, where he could have one at each fraternity house. But they always wondered where I come from and what I was doing, how I knew everything that was going on. All I did was just stand around and listen, you could figure out what was going on. Warren: So you really got your information from them? Murray: Yeah. They didn't know it, but I did. I've had them to tell me something would happen, and they would go off somewhere and lay low for about a week and then come back and say, "Well, I just want to tell you, because I know you'll find out," and they'd tell me. I had some times over here. I used to go over at night, I'd go out every night in the week. After being over here all day, I'd come back out at night and stay here three or four hours. But people don't work like that anymore. Warren: Why do you think you did it? Murray: I enjoyed my work, and I wanted to do a good job, and I think I did. I'm not bragging, but I think I did a fairly decent job. I used to catch a lot of people stealing stuff. One time one of our custodians had a son, during Christmas, the first Christmas I worked here, and he got into the dormitory and stole a bunch of stuff. So I went to his father and I told him, I said, "Now, if all that stuff comes back, I won't do anything, but if it don't, I am." So the next morning it was all laying on my desk. So that's what happened, they just brought it all back. Warren: Did you ever get involved in Honor System issues? Murray: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Warren: Can you tell me about that? 11 Murray: Well, one time I went in the gym, they were having quite a bit of money taken during P.E. classes. So I was in there dressing one day, making out like I was dressing to do something, and I noticed this young man come down through there, and then he walked by me, and I just didn't pay any attention to him. So when he went out the door, I sneaked around and looked up the aisle and he was putting something in his pocket. So I waited until class was over, and this boy told me somebody had taken his billfold, he had some $50 bills in it. Well, I had a pretty idea what happened to it, so I went to the boy that I saw take it go to class, and then I went over and searched his room. He took the money out of the billfold, and instead of doing away with it, he took it and put it in his suitcase under the bed and I found it. So he wasn't with us very long. I've had them forging checks. I used to get samples of handwriting and send it off to a good friend of mine who used to be a forensic man in the F.B.I., and he would let me know if the same handwriting matched, and it did. Warren: Do you think the Honor System works very well? Murray: I always believed in it, and I think it does a pretty good job. I always believed in it myself. I've had numerous cases like that in the E.C. Committee. One boy one time, I really wanted to teach him a lesson, and I think I did. He went over to Sweet Briar and got in some trouble over there and he gave them a false I.D., and they gave me a license number. So I checked on it, so I run him up before the E.C., and they put him on probation. I didn't want him kicked out school, but I wanted to teach him lesson. On the day he graduated, he said, "You taught me a lesson." He said, "I'll know not to lie again about my name." Warren: I actually had one person tell me that you are the person he learned the most from in this school. Murray: Yeah, I used to try teach them right from wrong. Just like I said, if they treated me right, I treated them right. I wouldn't go overboard to try and get them in trouble. 12 Yeah, talking about this Honor System, I've had quite a few students in trouble and they had to get rid of them, but I didn't get any kick out of it, because some of them I knew. I didn't want to do it, but I had to. Warren: So would you actually go and testify at E.C. hearings? Murray: Oh, yes. Warren: What was that like? I've never been to one. I've never had to do anything like that. Murray: These guys sitting there in those black robes, it's right intimidating to some of these kids who don't know what they're getting into. I've been there numerous times, but like I told you, I didn't get any kick out of it, but it was something that was serious enough I had to do something about it. Warren: I'm surprised when you say that they gave somebody probation. I thought there was only one thing— Murray: No, I was trying to teach him a lesson. I brought him up before them just to let them go over him, and they did, and he didn't lie anymore. I told them, I said, "I'm not trying to get this kid kicked out school." I said, "I want you guys to teach him a lesson," and they did. Warren: I always had the impression that there was only one thing that the E.C. could do. Murray: No. Well, I guess it was on the account of me, that I told them I was just trying to teach him a lesson, and they agreed with me. Warren: Did that happen more than once? Murray: No, that was the only time I had to do it. Warren: But with other students? Murray: No. Warren: He's lucky. 13 Murray: He's lucky. I kind of told them, I said, "I don't want to really do anything to him, I just want to teach him a lesson," and they did. Warren: I'll bet he was scared. Murray: He was. I've had all kinds of things down there, but like I told you, I don't get any kick out of it. Warren: So how long did you work? When did you stop? Murray: June 1991. Warren: So you were still very much here when the women arrived. Murray: Yeah, 1985. That's when Dr. Wilson didn't like the word "proctor," because the word "proctor" in the dictionary just says "overseer of university proctors," so forth. So he changed it to the Director of Security. That's when I had all the men. At the time, we didn't have but five or six, and they wasn't wearing uniforms. So I told them at a meeting, I says, "I want to put these men in uniforms, so the young ladies that are here at night won't be afraid to approach them if something's wrong." So they said, "Okay, we'll do it," and they did. Warren: Good idea. So how did your job change once there were Washington and Lee girls? Murray: Well, just had to be a little more careful. Had to make sure that the people didn't ride them and heckle them. The first group of girls we had here, we had 114 in the group, and I think one of them got in some trouble, and they let her go. Of the 114, 109 of them graduated. They were a little bit shook up, because they were the first girls. I made some awful good friends out of that group of girls, because I looked after them the best I could. Then we enlarged the force after they came, from about six people up to about, counting myself, there was twelve, so to have somebody here twenty-four hours a day, 365 days a year. This school never did believe in having the men go to a police academy and carry weapons. They didn't want that. Warren: So what kind of people would you hire? 14 Murray: Well, I hired the present boy that is assistant right now. This boy, they called him Baner, and he worked here at the school for years and he had M.P. experience in the service. Then I hired a man who'd been a police officer in California for twenty-five years. I hired this young black boy, he had just gotten out of the Marine Corps. Then I decided I had to have some women, so we hired Ruth, a black lady. They worked there pretty well, so now I think he has two young ladies, two of them, plus about thirteen men. At the time the pay wasn't real good, you know. Of course, I think they're making better now. I couldn't get them to raise the salary on them, so that's why we couldn't get people real experienced, but they knew what to do because we taught them. Warren: So what would you teach them? How did you go about training them? Murray: Just all the work they had to do, to tell them to be on the lookout for this, and look out for that, and told them what they could do and what they couldn't do. All they did was more or less security, and we told them that if any of the young ladies came by at night and wanted a ride somewhere, to take them, not let them walk. Told the young ladies, especially, if they parked up in the freshmen parking lot, and they wanted a ride back instead of walking, to come by the office and let somebody know and they'd pick them up and bring them back. But now they have a phone up there and you have to do is call. But at the time we didn't have a phone up there, but they have one now. In fact, they've got them all over campus where, in case of emergency, they can pick it up and call and it goes right straight to the security office. They had about six of them when I left. Of course, I think they have more now. Warren: Can you remember the preparations for having the girls arrive on campus? Murray: [Laughter] Well, they had to do a lot of changing around in the gymnasium, which didn't take them too long. They had to figure out how to put the girls in the dormitories, so they decided to put the girls on the second and third floor and boys on the first and fourth. So that's the way it's been working ever since. 15 Warren: Were there things that you had to do in particular to prepare for having them on campus? Murray: No, just like I say, we put the men in uniform and taught them what to expect, and be on alert at all times if anybody harassed them or bothered them, and they did. Warren: How did it change the relationship of the guys heading off to the women's schools? Murray: Well, the first year, a few of the girls dated local students, but then after we got more girls here, then more of them started dating girls here. Of course, some of the girls from other schools didn't think much of it, because the girls here were getting their dates and they couldn't get in, couldn't get the dates themselves. So they didn't think much of it at all. So finally the girls, especially when they were getting ready to have Fancy Dress, the girls from these other schools were coming and looking for dates, and our girls didn't think much of it either. So that's what happened. I think it's a whole lot better now. But like I told you, they still had their parties. Warren: You just mentioned Fancy Dress again, and I'm glad you did, because I'll bet you've got some good Fancy Dress stories. Murray: [Laughter] Oh, I don't know. For a while there, I just kind of stayed outside the building and tried to watch if they was bringing alcohol. I didn't want it in there if they could help it. So then the dance board got the idea that too many of them were getting in and wasn't paying, so they would put me there at the door with Steve and Tom and Fred Coffey, who works in the gym, security at the gym, and sometimes he works on the campus. All these alumni would come in there, start at the door on the other side and they'd ask for a pass and they'd say, "Well, we already ordered them." Then he'd send them over to me and I said, "Did you get them?" They said, "No." I'd say, "You're going to have to pay then." And they all paid. Because I knew them. They'd say, "Oh, come on, Murph, you know we ordered them." I said, "No, you didn't 16 either. I don't have your name on this list that you ordered the tickets, so just give us the money." So they did. Warren: I need to turn the tape over.