One nice thing about moving - you find stuff you need to go through and throw away, and in the "modern era" that means paper can be replaced with electronic images. I've selected several pictures from my early years, working for the Governors of Indiana and Iowa.
Pictured seated in the large group of people is the Hon. Otis Bowen, a two term Governor of Indiana. Standing on the right in the other picture is the Hon. Robert Ray, the Governor of Iowa. By extension (Governor's named my Commission members who hired me), I worked for both these fine gentlemen, and they truly were fine men. The picture of the large group was taken when Governor Bowen signed the bill creating the "new" Indiana Guaranteed Student Loan Program, in 1976. The picture with Governor Ray was taken on the occasion, in 1980, when the first student loan was made in Iowa.
In 1974, I had just graduated from college and taken a full time position (earning a whopping $10,100 a year) as a PAT IV (professional and technological officer, grade 4) Program Administrator of an old program called the College Loan Plan of Indiana. It originated its last guarantee in 1967, but somebody had to be there to sweep up the claims for death, disability and default. I went from a part time skip tracer at a credit bureau to a briefcase totin' pointy headed bureaucrat, hired to pay the occasional claim, and to track down those "deadbeat student defaulters". From tiny acorns a giant oak tree grows (my career....but not allegorical to dead wood), and this was my start in a career that would span from 1974 to 2003.
Believe it or not, I can still remember those names, from left to right: Jim Sunday, Deputy Director of the State Scholarship Commission of Indiana (SSACI), me, Bob Sinnaeve,Executive Director of United Student Aid Fund (USAF), Rick Reinhart (USAF), Gov. Bowen (seated), Nels Sheridan (USAF), Ron Jackson (SSACI) and Mahlon Waldo Carlock II (SSACI). Now you know the answer to "where's Waldo?"
I've lost track of many of these guys (probably could find them on Face Book, huh?) and of course some have gone on to their rewards. Carlock, who went by "Steve" went on from working for me to working as the chief legal counsel of USAF, is now in private practice as well as doing spiritual counseling. The Governor and Bob Sinnaeve have passed on. Rick was crossing my path for a second time - in the picture he was an operations person at USAF, but back in 1966 he worked at the same student radio station at Indiana University. He also did civilian broadcasting in Indianapolis, and last I knew went to California for USA Funds. Ron Jackson left SSACI to go back into banking in Southern Indiana. Nels was last in Carmel, IN, and maybe still as USA Funds. Jim Sunday went into some sort of financial business.
By the end of 1975, I had quickly come to the realization that chasing down and hauling into Court a litany of student loan debtors was a limited opportunity - I was clearing more cases than getting new ones to pursue. In 1976, the federal government solved my problem by creating incentives for states like Indiana (and subsequently Iowa and Missouri) to reinstate their state run loan programs, to replace a rapidly failing Washington, D.C. based program. During 1976 I started working with several of these folks to draft new legislation (passed in 1977) to create the new Indiana Guaranteed Student Loan Program, and from my accomplishments in Indiana I was able to parley my experience into my next job.
In 1978, I was off to Iowa to be number two in seniority at the Iowa College Aid Commission (I had two guys ahead of me in line in Indiana), where Governor Ray's board hired me to repeat the task of taking a state out of "federal orbit" and putting a new locally operated program into existence. I would spend four years in Iowa, starting out reporting to an elderly lady and an eleven member board, and two years later moving across the street to start a student loan secondary market (Iowa Student Loan Liquidity Corporation) which reported to a nine member board. That would be my first job where I was the top full time person, and I would stay until the middle of 1982 to get it off the ground and running. I came to Iowa to earn seventeen thousand dollars and to find career advancement - I left having doubled my wage, and finding my next and final career job working for yet another Governor, but this time a seven member board. But that's fodder for another time, another blog post.
If you're a fan of the old Saturday Night Live program, you'll remember Garrick Morris and Jane Curtain doing that interview bit with "Chico" Escuela of the Mets; but instead of baseball, I could say "student loans were berry, berry, good to me, Hane".
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