Fall 2012 Issue - Colby-Sawyer College

if you can get the students
homework.
woman to school for so
long. Bachelors’ degrees
were for young men, while
young women should
finish in two years and
“then go off and be a
secretary or get married.”
The positive side of that,
she notes, was that Colby
Junior College attracted
many brilliant women who
nowadays would likely
head to the Ivy League.
At the same time, however,
she sees students today
struggling with the broad
range of freedoms they
have been granted. “There
seem to be more students
who are psychologically
upset at Colby-Sawyer now,
given all of these freedoms
and then some of the bad
results,” she says. “Some
17- and 18-year-olds are
just not equipped to
handle it.” Academically,
things haven’t changed
quite as much. “I’ve always
had some excellent students,
some very poor
students, and the large
majority, from the beginning
to now, are ‘medium’
students, but ready to be
awakened,” she says.
Cleveland has worked
under all eight of the
college’s presidents,
starting with H. Leslie
Sawyer, who was in his
final year of leadership
when she began teaching
in 1955. She admired
Eugene Austin, president
from 1955 to 1962, who
involved Colby Junior
College students in the
wider world by hosting
forums on current events.
(“In those days he could
require the students to
attend, so they were pretty
well attended,” Cleveland
says wryly.) She has warm
memories of many other
administrators, particularly
an early dean and English
professor named Eleanor
Dodd. “The dean had very
little praise for anyone,
and when she said, ‘Good
job,’ or ‘I like that,’ it just
meant all the world because
she was chary with
her praise,” Cleveland recalls.
“She had very high
standards for faculty, so I
admired her tremendously.”
The town of New London
has evolved since Cleveland
arrived. Then, about
1,300 people lived in
New London, though the
population swelled in the
summer with the arrival of
visitors from Washington
and Philadelphia who
traveled north to escape
the heat. “What I see is
much more sophistication
in New London,” she
says now. “It’s not a little
farm town anymore.”
Despite her busy teaching
schedule, Cleveland always
made time for public
service. She campaigned
for her husband’s political
career, but she also served
as New London’s town
moderator for many years,
and accepted an appointment
by President George
H.W. Bush to serve on the
International Joint Commission,
a body that helps
Canada and the United
States negotiate boundary
water disputes. When she
switched her allegiance
to the Democratic Party in
2004, the news made
national headlines. This
year, she is supporting
President Obama and New
Hampshire gubernatorial
candidate Maggie Hassan.
Cleveland officially retired
in 1991, but she continued
teaching classes until
December of last year,
which she considers her
real retirement. Did
she expect to be at it this
long? “Oh, good heavens,
no,” she says with a laugh.
“I didn’t expect to live
this long!” She says she
kept teaching for so long
for a simple reason: She
loved it. “I know some
people don’t and they can
hardly wait for retirement,”
she explains. “But I
happen to like students,
and I happen to like
their different backgrounds
and points of view. I love
thinking that maybe they’re
getting interested.” Once
in a while she received
letters from former students
saying that her
classes inspired them to
be curious about history or
government for the first
time, and those letters
kept her going.
Even in retirement,
Cleveland remains active
and connected to the
college. She’s involved
with the adult-education
program Adventures in
Learning, which she
helped to found. With the
help of a student intern,
she is also beginning
to organize and box up her
papers, which she will
donate to the library
named for her husband’s
family. Always self-deprecating,
she calls the papers
“junk.” But for Colby-
Sawyer, Cleveland’s
papers—and memories—
are an invaluable record
of many decades of
history.
Fall 2012
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