Lamar University President, Dean, Chair, Department of Music

Began working at Lamar University in 1970

 ‘I was first associated with Lamar when I was in junior high school, about 1956. I was a student in junior high school, the band director wanted me to learn to play the oboe. I was a clarinet player. So, I went to the band director at Lamar to see if he would teach me oboe lessons. That was my first association with Lamar. I came back in 1970 as an instructor in the Department of Music and I was the Director of the Athletic band and the Jazz band, and assistant director of the symphony. I played in the symphony for many years.
      ‘Lamar University gave me a livelihood, basically my entire professional life at the university, and the friends, and the acquaintances, and the experiences I had are too numerous to mention. I began as an instructor, and soon became an assistant professor. Sometime, about 1983, I became the department chair of the Department of Music. After that I became the Dean of the College of Fine Arts. Simultaneously held the positions of Dean and Vice President of University Advancement, and then in 1999, I became President. My wife, Susan, was as much a president as I was. She probably had more impact on the university than I did. She was responsible for all of the upgrades and the beautification. We were a team.'

‘I was a faculty at Memphis State University at the time. I was also performing with the symphony in Memphis with a group called the Memphians, which is a group of the jazz players in Memphis. The Memphians was a band that accompanied Frank. It was a St. Jude benefit event. The band’s …of his good friends was Frank Sinatra and so we invited Frank to come and be one of the guest artists at the concert. We didn’t really think Frank would show up. There were 10,000 people at the concert and a helicopter landed. We had rehearsed with his conductor. And the helicopter landed and Frank Sinatra walked in. And then, when he left, we heard the helicopter leave.'

 'When I became President, we had gone from about 12,000 students to 7300, over a 12-year period, probably the lowest faculty salaries in the state, the campus was really in disrepair. So, when I was selected to be President, I said, well I don’t know if there is anything we can do. We will try for a year. If it doesn’t work out, I will just go back to being the band records. The campus and the community reconnected with many of our alumni and some wonderful donors and it started going the right way for us. A very exciting 14 years we spent because it seemed to be going up the entire time. This was wonderful. I get so much credit for it. But the truth was, I had one of the most fantastic teams you can ever put together. We had terrific people. We had Steve Doblin, Kevin Smith, Camille Mouton, great department chairs, wonderful Faculty Senate. It was a very exciting time to have such a great group of people to work with. With Steve Doblin and Kevin Smith, I did not make any decision without their input.'

‘My mother, Gladys Vernon, won the first state championship Lamar ever won when they were a junior college. She and Helen Johnson were doubles tennis partners in the state tournament and they brought the first-place trophy. The coach at the time was John Gray. He was their coach. My family has very strong long-term ties with Lamar University.'
 About the new President, Dr. Jaime Taylor

‘I am very excited about our new President Taylor. He is the right person at the right time. He is putting together a terrific team of people to work with, which is much to his credit. Lamar is now poised to continue to move forward and I am so excited about on his team to do it. I cannot say enough nice things about him and Dr. Brown.

https://fox4beaumont.com/news/community-news/tsus-board-of-regents-adds-susan-simmons-name-to-jimmy-simmons-music-building-at-lamar 
‘The Jimmy Simmons Music Building on campus is now being renamed the Susan and Jimmy Simmons Music Building.’ —   President Jimmy Simmons

B.S. in Elementary Education, Class of 1968
Interviewed by Vidisha Barua Worley on 07/25/2023

‘I grew up in Beaumont. As I was growing up, about 10 or 11 years old, my Dad had a business on Port Arthur Highway, right across from Lamar University. We used to go to Railroad Avenue, which is now MLK. I went off to college to Texas Tech in Lubbock. I came home for the summer my senior year and Jimmy was teaching at Beaumont High and we met and got engaged. When I came home for Christmas during my senior year, I decided to transfer to Lamar because we were going to get married in June. In January of 1968, I started going to Lamar to finish my college hours. I graduated from Lamar in 1968. I taught at Fletcher Elementary for one year and then Jimmy took a job at Memphis State University in Memphis, Tennessee. And we moved there. We had our first child, Jennifer, while we were living in Memphis in January of 1970. Lamar called Jimmy to come and interview for the Marching Band Director’s job. So he came and interviewed for the job and he took it and so we moved back to Beaumont. We have been in Lamar ever since in 1970. We raised our kids, three kids, twin boys. We raised them out here in the football fields. Lamar, and Jimmy and I, and our kids, we all grew up together. Jimmy was the marching band director, the chair, then he became the dean, and then the President. We moved on the campus. We lived in the President’s house for about 15 years.
        'When we moved out there, we didn’t have any dorms. So, I worked with the architect and with the builders on the dorms. I picked out the bricks, had to design them, picked out the colors, the furniture, all of that. We didn’t have the staff to do that. I decided that the grounds looked horrible, all overgrown. So, we outsourced a landscaping business and brought somebody in and I worked with them on getting the campus cleaned up, the cigarettes picked up. I did every bit of that. I also decided to paint the buildings. The brick was ugly. There was a yellow brick that was all over campus. We painted that a cream color. We tried to match the Montagne Center so all tied together. We left the red bricks that were on the buildings. But we painted the yellow bricks into a soft cream color. I helped design the new dining hall. I am real proud of the way the university looks now. When we first got here in 1970, it was awful. The grounds have been neglected, the buildings had been neglected. I designed the street, Rolfe Christopher Drive. I designed the outside fencing around the campus. Our Chancellor at the time, Lamar G. Urbanovsky, he was and A&M graduate, and he was an architect. He and I worked so well together. He and I worked together on the grounds and the campus, designing things. I am realtor. The first thing that everybody looks at is curb appeal. If it looks so bad, nobody wants to come. We did the MLK, planted the roses, the hedges. I have loved it and had a good time. It was one of the most rewarding things I have ever done. As long as we had the money and the budget, we did it.

‘My favorite thing was when we brought back football, opening the new dining hall, and the new dorms.’

FULL CIRCLE: ‘Mary and John Gray’s daughter, Ann, was my third-grade elementary school teacher. When she got married, I was in the third grade, and my mother and I had a bridal shower for Ann Gray. When Jimmy and I got married, Mary and Ann had a bridal shower for me.’