Lamar's Wooster retires but his teaching goes on

For 52 years, Ralph Wooster has stood tall as the consummate gentleman-scholar at Lamar University. He has distinguished himself as a teacher, administrator, historian, mentor – and legend.

“His depth of knowledge is impressive, his standing among academic historians is unequaled, and his remarkable ability to tell, not just teach, the story that is history inspires others of us in the profession to attempt to achieve his level of expertise,” says fellow history teacher Ken Poston, one of many eager to lend their voices to his praise.

Wooster, recently honored as distinguished professor emeritus of history, will retire at the end of the fall 2006 semester. To celebrate his illustrious career, faculty, students, staff and the community will honor him at a reception Nov. 28, hosted by Lamar’s Department of History and the Walter Prescott Webb Historical Society.

The reception will be from 3 to 6 p.m. in the Dishman Art Museum, MLK Jr. Parkway at East Lavaca on the Lamar campus. Students, faculty, staff and other well-wishers are invited to join in the event, said history department chair John Storey.

This marks the second retirement for Wooster, who stepped down from full-time teaching in 1991 but continued to teach one class per semester.

But, said his colleague and former student, Lamar history instructor Carol Atmar: “He won’t ever quit teaching because we keep teaching what he’s taught us. He’s a treasure and a Godsend.”

A noted historian, author and scholar, Wooster has devoted his career not only to Lamar but to students and history lovers everywhere. He joined the faculty in 1955, adding – or changing – hats along the way to serve as department chair, dean of graduate studies, dean of faculties, associate vice president for academic affairs and interim executive vice president for academic and student affairs.

But his heart has remained in the classroom.

“His first love is teaching,” said Lamar President James Simmons. “And that love is an enduring gift to Lamar University.”

Simmons added, “While Dr. Wooster is well known and highly regarded at Lamar, his distinguished reputation extends far beyond the bounds of our campus. He has a national reputation as a writer of history. It is not uncommon to meet someone from another city or state for whom Lamar University draws an immediate frame of reference, by virtue of a history textbook well remembered, with Dr. Ralph Wooster as its author.”

To call Wooster a gentleman and a scholar scarcely captures the depth and breadth of his contributions to history and to higher education. For thousands of students over more than five decades, Wooster made history come alive in the classroom. They share their esteem for him with colleagues, historians, history buffs and other teachers.

“In the academic world of hefty egos, Ralph is a humble man, a gentleman-scholar,” said Kevin Smith, senior associate provost. “The stories of Texas are his legacy. Ralph won’t truly retire; he will just sharpen his pencils.”

Meeting at Lamar Nov. 17, regents of The Texas State University System adopted a resolution honoring Wooster  – “a great Texan who has told the state’s story to generations past, present and to come” – as distinguished professor emeritus of history, also naming the history department conference room in the Archer Building in his honor.

More than four decades earlier, in 1964, Wooster became the first Lamar faculty member to be recognized by the Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation as one of Texas’ 10 outstanding college teachers. Only 10 Lamar faculty members have received the honor since. He was named regents’ professor of history in 1972 and earned the Phi Kappa Phi Award for Distinguished Teaching in 1976.

Wooster,  a native of Baytown, and his wife, Edna, have been married 59 years. Their son, Robert, is professor of history at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi and, in 1998, followed in his father’s footsteps as a Piper Professor.    “This is a big step, of course,” Wooster reflected, on the day he received the board of regents’ honor. “I know I’m going to miss the teaching. But the time has come to step aside. I’ve still got a couple of projects I’m working on in terms of writing, and I’m on a couple of masters’ thesis committees . . . It’s all been fun, particularly the teaching part.”

Wooster takes great pride in the number of his students who go on to write and publish books. “I kept track at one time, and I guess I’ve had 20 whose work has been published,” he said in a 2002 interview. “That’s what makes you feel great.”

Fellow historian and author Ellen Rienstra first took classes from Wooster in the 1960s, when, she says,  “all of us, including Dr. Wooster, were young. I signed up for his classes as often as I was able, and I was lucky enough to take his celebrated Civil War course.

“Hearing him lecture was the first time I realized that history was a huge, ever-fascinating story. There are always teachers who inflame a student’s imagination, and, for me, Dr. Wooster was one of those teachers,” Rienstra said. “ He is one of the greatest historians I’ve known and one of the finest gentlemen. It has been my honor and privilege to have been associated with him.”

Jo Ann Stiles, distinguished associate professor emerita of history, taught alongside Wooster almost 40 years and, like Wooster, earned Piper Professor honors. 

“He is one of those truly amazing people you don’t run into very many times in your life,” Stiles said.  “He’s a gentleman and a gentle man. He’s a wonderful teacher, and he’s had more of an impact on students’ lives than anyone I can think of. He’s produced so many students who have gone on to fantastic careers all around the country.”

Even those who couldn’t get into one of Wooster’s classes find their lives and careers touched by him. One of them was Ken Poston, advanced-placement history teacher at West Brook High School and an adjunct instructor of history at Lamar.

“The one regret I have about my college career at Lamar is that I was never able to take a course from Dr. Wooster because the schedules always conflicted,” Poston said. “This is particularly disappointing as both my sons, Keven and Trey, were able to take history courses from him.”

While Poston was completing his degrees and teaching certification, he recalls, his younger son, Trey, remarked: “If you can teach history half as well as Dr. Wooster can, you will be all right.”

Said the elder Poston: “Just to have my name listed on the history department website along with Dr. Wooster’s is, to me, a singular honor . . . I became a better student in knowing Dr. Wooster and have become a better teacher in attempting to shamelessly emulate his techniques.”

Says former student Judith Linsley, education coordinator for the McFaddin-Ward House Museum: “When I attended Lamar in the ’60s, Ralph Wooster’s classes were always filled in the first few hours of registration. Students who hated history took his courses because he made them so interesting – and his tests were hard!

“The world needs more Dr. Woosters, but he’s one of a kind,” Linsley said. “He’s one of the finest teachers, and men, I have ever known.”

Indeed, said Patty Renfro, administrative associate in the history department, “Dr, Wooster’s classes always fill up during the first couple of days of registration. When students call and want to get into his class, we kindly tell them his classes are full.”

Atmar was able to enroll in a number of Wooster’s courses – “I did the Wooster immersion – the baptism, I think,” she said. “I always thought in listening to him in class that he could tell you the face markings and the hoof marking of every horse in the Army if you needed to know that.

“He’s very wise, very knowledgeable and just a challenge. He has inspired people on Lamar’s faculty and all over the country,” Atmar said. “I still refer to my class notes from Wooster courses, and even to my textbooks.”

Wooster  has “touched, guided and inspired the intellectual lives of thousands of undergraduate and graduate students, as well as hundreds of thousands of Texas seventh-graders who learned the history of this great state by reading his widely adopted ‘Texas and Texans,’ according to the regents’ resolution.

“Dr. Wooster, a masterful storyteller, delivered spellbinding lectures that attracted students and scholars alike to Lamar University, earning for himself the reputation for excellence sought by every classroom instructor, and did so without a single power-point or podcast . . . (his) fairness, goodwill, decency and evenhandedness toward students and colleagues brought him the high regard and respect that today are synonymous with his name.”

Wooster has earned local, regional and national acclaim among historians for his scholarly works, including eight highly praised books. He has edited or co-authored others. “Texas and Texans in World War II” is his most recent book, published in 2005, and another, about Texans in World War I, is at press now. He has been active in the Texas State Historical Association and East Texas Historical Association, serving as member, president and fellow of both.

Brenda Nichols, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, which includes the history department, was at a meeting of the Council of Colleges of Arts and Sciences in San Diego when she met a new dean and another university official with ties to Texas. “Both of them asked whether Dr. Wooster was still at Lamar,” Nichols recalls. “They talked about what a wonderful role model he was and said he had inspired them both to pursue history.”

The term “role model” comes up frequently. “He’s been my model ever since I came to Lamar (in 1962),” said Howell Gwin, professor of history. “He’s always been the one I patterned myself on, the one I went to for advice. I’m really going to miss him.”

Although he has known Wooster for a fraction of the veteran professor's tenure at Lamar, Stephen Doblin, provost and vice president for academic affairs, aptly captured the sentiments of the many students and colleagues who will gather the Tuesday after Thanksgiving to pay tribute to him.

“It is clear that Dr. Wooster is the epitome of the teacher-scholar and has had a positive and lasting impact upon thousands of Lamar University students and faculty colleagues,” Doblin said.

“I have never heard a bad word about Ralph Wooster, and those with whom I’ve spoken over the past six years use almost reverent tones when discussing their admiration for his teaching, his research, and his commitment to his students, his discipline, his colleagues and Lamar University. There is no doubt that we are a better institution because Dr. Wooster has been part of our academic community.”