A Summer in Iowa

Part 5 — Dinner with a Teacher

Sunday, January 16, 1972

The delay in getting Mom’s approval to apply to the SSTP was killing me. I spent much of the weekend working on the two essays. They couldn’t be any longer than 750 words, which was about two or three pages, typed, double-spaced. Fortunately, with my terrible handwriting, Mom sat me down in front of a typewriter when I was twelve, so typing the essays wasn’t gonna be a problem for me.

To most people, 750 words sounded like a lot, but to me, that was terribly limiting. How could I say what needed to be said in only two or three typewritten pages? I needed to be concise and highlight only the most important points. Unfortunately, brevity wasn’t one of my strong suits.

The first essay was about my research interests. I wasn’t sure why they needed to know my research interests, but perhaps a research project was part of all four tracks. The problem was, I didn’t really have any research interests. I knew I was interested in science and technology, but I hadn’t yet tried to narrow my studies down more than that. I wasn’t even certain whether I wanted to major in science or engineering, let alone in any field within those broad areas, although I’d have to pursue one or the other in making college applications in less than a year.

On the other hand, perhaps it didn’t really matter. I might actually take advantage of my lack of a firm plan for the future as one of the main reasons for applying to the SSTP. That could be the focus of the second essay. However, in terms of my research interests, I remembered that Professor Dixon said something about Iowa having one of the best astrophysics departments in the world, so perhaps that was a place to start.

I could write about my attending the planetarium shows at Butler as a boy and getting a home planetarium for Christmas when I was twelve. I just wouldn’t mention that it still sat unopened on my closet shelf. Since I was interested in the computer science track, I could highlight my fascination with computers and my perception that the era of Star Trek-like human-computer interactions wasn’t nearly as far off as most people thought.

The second essay focused on why I wanted to attend the SSTP. In other words, what did I hope to get out of it? Although the need to be on my own for the first time in my life was a big part of it, I feared that if I admitted to never having been away from home before, I might be perceived as being immature. Instead, I’d write about my plans for early graduation and beginning college as a sophomore when I was only seventeen.

With a shortened timeline, the need for a benchmark by which I could judge other colleges for potential matriculation was critical. Perhaps the SSTP could serve as that benchmark, while simultaneously giving me a chance to try out computer science as one of several career paths I might wish to pursue. Anticipating that some might question my intent to finish high school early, I would explain that high school was inadequate in helping to narrow my focus. Only a college experience could help me to better evaluate my potential career paths.

With those thoughts in mind, I started to write.

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Thursday, January 20, 1972

I hadn’t had a chance to corner Mr. Franklin until the next Tuesday lab session. I asked him if I could give my mother his contact information, but he said he thought it would be better if they met. I assumed he meant he wanted to schedule a meeting at school, but he asked me if my mother and I would be free on Thursday evening for dinner at 6:00 PM, at his house. I’d never thought of my teachers as having lives outside of school before. Indeed, most teachers seemed to go to great lengths to avoid talking about their personal lives.

Now, Mr. Franklin wanted to have my mother and me over for dinner to discuss the SSTP. Of course I told him I’d have to let him know, which I did the next day, after my mother accepted the offer. He gave me his address. It turned out he lived in a townhouse in a complex not far from where we lived.

I asked my mom what to wear. She assured me that dressy casual clothes would be appropriate for all but a formal dinner party, and that I could just wear the same clothes I’d worn to school that day. However, I decided to change from wearing a V-neck sweater over my button-up shirt to a more casual crew neck.

Mom asked if Mr. Franklin had a wife and kids, and sheepishly I had to admit that I had no idea. She mused that we’d find out when we got there. She brought a bottle of wine, which is something I wouldn’t have thought about at all. I had to admit that mom looked nice, dressed in one of her nicer dresses with an elegant broach, necklace and earrings that matched.

We pulled up in front of his building and quickly found his unit number. Walking up from the parking lot, Mom reached forward and rang the doorbell. I felt underdressed when he opened the door. Mr. Franklin was wearing black slacks, a white shirt, a grey tweed dinner jacket and a red bowtie. For an older guy, he looked hot, but I couldn’t for the life of me explain where that thought came from.

As he stepped aside, Mom gave him the bottle of wine, which he not only took from her but also actually read the label and thanked her for bringing such an excellent wine. I know shit about wine and was surprised Mr. Franklin was familiar with the kind Mom bought. Walking into the apartment, there was some soft music playing in the background and immediately, Mom asked, “Is that Kind of Blue playing?”

Mr. Franklin replied, “Miles Davis, with John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Cannonball Adderley, Paul Chambers and Jimmy Cobb. Never before or since has so much talent been concentrated on one album, although I have to admit, the Beatles came close.” Seriously, the Beatles?

“It sounds wonderful,” Mom continued. “You must have a fine stereo for the music to sound this good. If I closed my eyes, I could almost swear they’re playing right in this room.”

“I’m a bit of an audiophile, and a collector of rare albums,” Mr. Franklin admitted. “I won’t bore you with the details, but suffice to say I spent more on my sound system than most people spend on a car.” Holy crap! “It’s my one true weakness. This copy of Kind of Blue is a rare first pressing. I picked it up at an estate sale for a fraction of what it was worth. It was in pristine condition, too, perhaps hardly if ever played.”

Leading us further inside, he took our coats and hung them up. Then he asked, “Would you like to share the wine with me? I have some cheese and crackers to enjoy while I finish getting dinner ready.”

“That would be lovely,” Mom replied.

“Why don’t the two of you sit down, and I’ll be right back.”

Mom and I sat down next to each other on the living room sofa. Mr. Franklin returned a moment later, carrying a serving plate with an assortment of fancy crackers, a few blocks of different cheeses and what I presumed to be a cheese slicer. In his other hand, he carried three wine glasses by their stems. I couldn’t help but wonder if he was going to serve me wine.

Setting the cheese and the wine glasses down in front of us, he asked me, “Would ginger ale be okay in place of wine, Jeff? Of course I also have Coke and Seven-Up, or you could have apple juice, cranberry juice or just plain water.”

“Ginger ale would be great,” I answered.

Mr. Franklin disappeared again for a moment, reemerging with a corkscrew, a coaster and a sweating can of Canada Dry ginger ale. He opened the can and poured a little of it into one of the wine glasses, which he set down in front of me, and then set the can down on top of the coaster next to the wine glass. Next, he removed the foil from the top of the wine bottle, inserted the corkscrew and used it to pull the cork out. He poured wine into the other two wineglasses and handed one to my mom, keeping the other for himself. After he sat down in a seat across from us, they both took a sip.

“You made the dinner?” Mom asked, sounding a bit surprised.

“There’s no one else here to make it,” he answered. “In answer to your inevitable question, I was married once, just out of college. Sadly, just like in Love Story, when she couldn’t get pregnant, we discovered she had an aggressive form of ovarian cancer. She was gone in less than a year.”

“That’s sad,” Mom responded.

“It was years ago, but I never really did get over it. I’ve poured my heart and soul into my teaching since then, and here I am.”

After an uncomfortable silence, Mom said, “I don’t know if Jeff told you, but my husband was killed in an industrial accident three years ago.”

“Yes, he mentioned it,” Mr. Franklin replied. “I understand it was on Christmas Eve.”

“Yes, that was a particularly bad time for something like that,” Mom responded. “Even now it’s hard to separate the holiday from what happened. This year, I decided to do something about it, so I put together a photo album of Christmases past. The photos had been piled inside an old shoebox, which was left to collect dust on my closet shelf.

“Jeff and I looked at the photos together, some of them ones he’d never seen before. How much better to remember the good times than that one horrible night.”

Wondering if it was okay for me to join in, but then proceeding anyway, I said, “Afterwards, I decided to look for Dad’s old camera. It’s a Kodak Duaflex. When I found it, there was still film inside. I’m afraid I broke the camera trying to get the film out, though. Something snapped and now the film advance turns freely without moving the film.

“I opened the camera in a completely darkened closet and removed the film by feel. It uses roll film with a paper backing. I took it to Hook’s for developing, and it came back the day after New Year’s. Turns out it was from the last time we went hiking together in Turkey Run State Park before he died. We also went to the Rockville Covered Bridge Festival that day. I’m so glad I found Dad’s old camera. Those pictures mean a lot to us.”

“Were you able to fix the camera?” Mr. Franklin asked.

“I thought about taking it downtown, but I won’t get my license until May and we don’t get there very often. My allergist’s office is across from Methodist Hospital, and I have an appointment next week for an allergy shot. Maybe I’ll take it to Robert’s Camera while we’re downtown. Frankly I’m not sure it’s worth it, though.”

“A vintage camera like that is worth much more if it works,” Mr. Franklin countered. “Why don’t you bring it into school next week and we can take a look at it. It’s probably just a broken spring. That’s easy to fix.”

“I thought that too, but the shutter release and film advance mechanism are part of one assembly that’s riveted in place. There’s no way to get inside of it.”

“Sure there is,” Mr. Franklin said. “You can drill out the rivets and when you put it back together, you can replace the rivets with screws. What’s the harm in trying? Bring it in anyway.”

“I suppose,” I said.

Mom and Mr. Franklin started chatting, and I kind of zoned out. With nothing better to do, I sliced up some of the cheese and started pigging out on it. Before I realized it, I’d eaten half the cheese and crackers. Yikes, how’d that happen?

Then Mr. Franklin got up and said, “If you’ll excuse me, I have to put the finishing touches on dinner.”

The moment he was out of sight and hopefully out of earshot, Mom said, “You never told me what a charming man your chemistry teacher is. He’s so knowledgeable about so many things and he has such a passion for music. Tom’s tastes are eclectic for someone from my generation…”

“Tom?” I asked.

“Tom Franklin. Surely you knew your chemistry teacher’s name is Tom.”

“I suppose I did, but I never gave it much thought,” I related.

“He has a wicked sense of humor,” Mom continued. “A dry sense of humor. Very subtle. I like that.”

“His humor’s definitely a bit off-kilter,” I admitted. “The main thing is that he gets teenagers. He understands us. He’s able to see the humor in things and even makes off-color jokes with maybe a bit of a double meaning, but he never says things that aren’t appropriate. He’s a popular teacher, even with kids who hate chemistry. One of my favorite teachers for sure.”

As Mom and I talked, we could hear what sounded like the sound of a mixer. Then the lights went on in an alcove off the living room, which obviously served as the dining room. A table and chairs were set with a white tablecloth and dinnerware. Mr. Franklin entered the dining room, carrying a serving platter with a large hunk of meat on it. He brought in several more serving dishes and then announced, “Dinner is served.”

The table was set with three place settings, simple but elegant stoneware and modern stainless flatware. The overall effect was inviting without appearing overstated. I liked it. I took the middle seat. Mom and Mr. Franklin took the end seats, facing each other.

In the center of the table was a platter with a sizzling hunk of beef. I figured it was probably prime rib. Surrounding the roast was a colorful array of potatoes, carrots, green and red peppers, and a variety of roast vegetables. Other serving bowls on the table included salad greens, mashed potatoes and green beans with what looked like pieces of almonds mixed in. A covered basket most likely contained dinner rolls.

Mom asked, “How in the world did you have time to prepare a rib roast in the time since school let out?”

“Simple. I used my time machine.” When we just sat there with our mouths hanging open, he elaborated. “It’s an essential trick often used by working folks, but even professional chefs use this strategy. It allows them to juggle multiple meals at once and results in a juicier roast too.

“The key is to have everything finished at the same time, but not necessarily started together. I did all the prep work last night and I put the roast in the oven at a low temperature for a couple of hours, then let it sit in the fridge overnight.

“When I arrived home today, I put the roast in the oven, with all of the vegetables, peeled and boiled the potatoes and cooked the green beans on the stove. While everything was cooking, I prepared the salad as well as my special salad dressing. The only shortcut was with the dinner rolls, which are brown and serve, and I prepared those in my toaster oven.”

“Well it all looks and smells delicious,” Mom exclaimed. I couldn’t help but agree.

“It’s all chemistry,” Mr. Franklin responded, “not much different from what my students and I do in the lab every day, when you get down to it.”

“So for the next lab, are you gonna teach us how to prepare a rib roast over a bunsen burner?” I asked.

“With a pressure vessel, it’s doable, but you’d probably have better luck using the equipment in Home Ec,” Mr. Franklin countered. “Perhaps you should sign up for it next year.”

Laughing, I replied, “I think I’ll pass on that.”

“So how do you like your meat, Betty?” Mr. Franklin asked. I nearly choked on the double meaning of meat, and what was with calling my mom ‘Betty’?

“I’m sorry if this sounds particular, but I like it medium rare, but with only the barest hint of pink in the center,” Mom replied.

“How about you, Jeff?”

“I like it medium rare, too,” I replied, “but sort of in the other direction. I like it red in the center and pink throughout, but fully cooked.”

Mr. Franklin proceeded to slice the roast into thick slabs of meat, giving each of us exactly what we’d asked for. For himself, he sliced off a slab that to me looked to be barely cooked. As he did so, he served each of us a portion of the vegetables.

He passed around the salad greens, mashed potatoes and green beans. Finally, he passed around a gravy boat with extra juice from the roast, which we added to the mashed potatoes. He poured additional wine into his and Mom’s wine glasses, and ice water from a pitcher into each of our water glasses.

As I bit into my prime rib, I couldn’t get over how tender and tasty it was. The mashed potatoes were loaded with butter and something else—maybe cheese—and seasoned with spices I’d never tasted before. I had to stifle a moan when I tasted them.

Echoing my thoughts, Mom asked, “What’s in these potatoes, Tom? They’re incredible.”

“It’s a surprisingly simple recipe,” He replied. “Just a stick of butter, a cup of grated parmesan, a quarter cup of dijon mustard, some chopped scallions, fennel seed, cilantro and a little salt. There’s nothing to it.”

“Maybe nothing to you, but they’re wonderful,” Mom added. I didn’t disagree.

As we enjoyed the meal, Mr. Franklin began our discussion with, “The reason I asked you to dinner was to answer any questions you had about Jeff’s hopeful participation in the SSTP at the University of Iowa this summer.”

“Yes, and I appreciate it,” Mom responded. “What I don’t understand is what Jeff would get out of it. He already has access to an outstanding program of education, right here in Indianapolis. He goes to a top high school and will finish a year early. He’ll have enough college-level instruction to test out of his freshman year of college. He attends a special program of weekly instruction in advanced math and physics at Butler. He has access to dozens of seminars at IUPUI, Indiana Central and Butler. What can he get in Iowa that he can’t already get here?” That didn’t sound good!

“Betty, did you go to college?” Mr. Franklin asked.

“I’d planned to, but then I met my husband,” Mom replied. “He was my brother’s roommate at Purdue. He was older than me and finishing college while I was still in high school. By the time I graduated, he was already working for GM and interested in starting a family. My education took a back seat to his career.

“I was born during the Great Depression, and Pearl Harbor happened when I was just shy of nine. Of course everyone, even children, did their part to support the war effort. We owned a small grocery, and while Daddy was off fighting in Europe, I helped out in the store after school and during the summers. After the war, I continued working in the store, saving for college, but then I met Max and we used the money instead to pay off his college loans and to buy furniture for our first apartment.”

“Living as a newlywed, making a home while your husband went off to work, must’ve been a very different experience from living at home with your parents and going to high school,” Mr. Franklin quietly pointed out.

“Completely,” Mom agreed. “I was so ill-prepared for it. I learned by trial and error. At first, it was mostly by error.”

“Going away to college is very different from living at home and going to high school, too,” Mr. Franklin explained. “High school can prepare you for the academic aspects of college, but it doesn’t come close to preparing you for the emotional aspects of campus life. It’s not stressful in the way that living as a new bride was, but it poses its own challenges. Living in a dorm with other boys… and for the first time, girls, away from parents and without supervision means different things to different people.

“Even for kids who went away to summer camp, it isn’t the same. Summer camp helps build independence from parents, but it’s a highly-supervised environment. Jeff didn’t even go away to camp, did he?”

“Jeff preferred day camp because it ran all summer,” Mom replied, “and then he started going to summer school.”

“So when he goes to college, it’ll be his first experience away from home, won’t it?”

“I hadn’t thought of that before!” Mom exclaimed.

“Like a lot of kids away from home for the first time, he’ll be exposed to alcohol, marijuana and other drugs, all-night parties and promiscuous sex for the first time, without any barriers,” Mr. Franklin went on. “A lot of kids can handle it and police themselves, but quite a few can’t. The advantage of the SSTP is that it provides a realistic collegiate experience and exposure to life in a dorm, but one that’s supervised.

“There are adult advisors on each of the dorm floors and the academic program is highly structured. There are bi-weekly seminars and optional recreational activities where they can socialize under supervision. Yet they also have the opportunity to experience the freedom of being on their own, to take responsibility for keeping their dorm room clean and for doing their own laundry. On the weekends, they can go out to a movie or for pizza with friends.

“Experiencing campus life in a supervised environment will also help Jeff to evaluate potential places he might go to college for his undergraduate education. At least he’ll have a benchmark with which to judge the facilities and environment at places like Stanford, Harvard and MIT. He’ll be in a much better position to make a decision on which offer to take when the acceptance letters start to come in.”

“But why Iowa,” Mom asked. “Why not Harvard, or MIT, or Stanford?”

“Not that any of those actually has a program for high school students, but do you really want your son spending his summer in Boston or San Francisco?”

“Well, no, but there are better schools, closer to home,” Mom countered. “How about the University of Michigan. It’s a public Ivy.”

“Michigan’s a fine university, and they do have a summer program, but it’s only open to high school juniors,” Mr. Franklin responded. “On the other hand, Iowa’s program is much better-structured, and they go the extra mile by including sophomores too. Besides which, they have one of the best astrophysics departments in the world.”

After a pause, Mom said, “Jeff doesn’t need any more astrophysics. He’s already in a college-level physics program, in a top astrophysics department at Butler, run by one of the top physicists in the world. He isn’t interested in the biology track, so that leaves the computer science track. That hardly seems like it would be a worthwhile endeavor.”

“Computer science is poised to become one of the fastest growing areas of applied mathematics in history,” Mr. Franklin tried to explain. “There isn’t a single area of science and engineering that won’t be affected by the growth of computer science. Already, an introductory programming course is required for any engineering degree and is strongly encouraged in the sciences too. Someday soon, computers will be ubiquitous.”

“But isn’t computer science a niche field, limited to those who design, build and program computers?” Mom asked.

“Hardly,” Mr. Franklin responded, and then he asked, “Remember the first time you saw a calculator?” Mom and I both nodded our heads. “You probably saw someone entering numbers into what looked like an adding machine, but it was silent and no paper came out. Then you moved around and saw the answers on an electronic display. Now, that four-function calculator is small enough to slip into a shirt pocket and the new HP35 scientific calculator is capable of replacing a slide rule. It’s faster and more accurate too.

“Consider the simple act of typing a term paper,” Mr. Franklin continued. “IBM already makes a typewriter that connects to tape recorder and records each keystroke, allowing you to go back and edit what you type. Then it retypes the final version for you. But a computer can do all of that. Instead of typing and retyping your term paper by hand, you can type it into the computer, edit it on the computer and store it on a tape or on a disk. When you’re ready to turn it in, you can simply have the computer print it out.

“But computers can do so much more. They can solve equations, analyze lab data, perform statistical analysis, sift through reams of information that would take hours of work in the library, all in a matter of seconds. An IBM 360 computer can do all of those things right now, but it takes up an entire room and can cost millions. Ten years from now, an even more powerful computer will fit on a desktop and cost only thousands. Twenty years from now, it’ll fit in a briefcase and cost hundreds.

“Imagine a computer size of a three-ring notebook, with a typewriter keyboard on the inside on one half, and a larger version of a calculator display on the other half. You could take that computer with you to class and type your papers between classes. Maybe you could even type your notes during classes. Can you imagine how that would transform student life?

“Right now, North Central High School is building a series of computer labs. The first two of them will open before the end of the school year, in time to use in Jeff’s chemistry class. Each classroom will have workstations for each student, where they’ll go through a series of interactive lessons at their own pace.

“The beauty of using computers is that the lessons can be adjusted for each student, based on their responses. If they seem to be struggling with one type of problem, the computer will spend more time on it. I don’t have the time to do that in the classroom, but the computer can, and it has infinite patience.

“Computer science might not be what Jeff wants to do with his life, but I can guarantee that no matter what field of study in science or engineering Jeff chooses to pursue, computers will be an integral component. Taking the computer science track in Iowa will be far from a waste of time. It will fit into his college education, whatever he does and wherever he goes.”

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Mr. Franklin’s sales pitch ended up being a bit too effective with Mom. Not only did she want me to enroll in the computer track of the SSTP, but she wanted me to consider a career in computer science. That wasn’t at all what I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to learn how to use computers in whatever career path I chose. I didn’t want to spend my life designing and building them.

With Mom’s approval, I completed my application to the SSTP. I wrote my two essays and typed them up. I ran them by both Mr. Franklin and Dr. Dixon and then rewrote and retyped them. Finally, I had Mom proofread them. I submitted Mr. Franklin’s name and address as an academic reference and Dr. Dixon’s name and address as a personal reference, as he was my mentor. I paid $10 and obtained a certified copy of my school transcript from my guidance counselor. Enclosing my most recent class photograph and a check for fifty dollars, I sent the application off by certified mail.