The Grounds Report:
A Conversation with Gene Jacobson

Interview by Rosa Jimenez, Editor of Westwind

Note: In 1979 I was an academy junior and I needed a job. A friend told me the college Grounds Department was hiring and that I should look up Gene Jacobson. I remember tracking him down at what was then known as the Industrial Technology Center, where he and the grounds crew were planting trees and laying sod in the front of the new building. I asked for a job and he gave one to me on the spot. I ended up working for Grounds until my junior year in college. Although I would intersperse other odd jobs during these years, on Grounds I found as many hours of work as I needed, a love of working outside, but most of all, many great friends--always a top priority for a college student. I interviewed Gene in his office--characteristically cluttered and with fine layers of dust throughout. His office is still in an upper level room overlooking the Grounds Shop.

Rosa: Before I ask you about your work, let me ask about you. When I worked for you, you didn’t have any kids. Now you have two and even a grandson who you like to show pictures of. Hard to believe, huh? How old is he?
Gene: He’s two or going to turn two in just a couple days. In fact we’re going to go see him this weekend.

R: Tell me about your wife. Not everybody knows who she is.
G: Her name is Linda. We were married December 23, 1989, in Grand Cayman island, on a Maranatha project.

R: The kids were how old when you became their dad?
G: Eight and eleven. Now Sarah is a junior nursing student at the community college and Aaron has his own business here doing Venetian blinds.

R: So do you and Linda plan on staying in the area for a while?
G: I think so.

R: How long have you worked at Grounds?
G: I’ve worked here for 25 years. Started in June of 1977. When I look back it just seems like a moment since then. I see old kids that used to work for me, and you know, I think it’s only been five or six years but it’ll have been 20 years since they worked for me.

R: Like me for instance. I think I worked last in 1983. That would be about 20 years.
G: Isn’t that something.

R: It’s strange. But that’s the way it goes. I noticed that you were at the WWVA Alumni Reunion (Walla Walla Valley Academy).
G: Yes, I had my 30-year reunion this weekend. (laughs)

R: That’s what reunions are for. To remind you how old you are. Well, who are some of the grounds alumni you’ve seen lately? People who haven’t seen in a long time.
G: Well, this spring we had a grounds reunion. I think we had about 75 people.
   It was really good to see some of those kids I haven’t seen in a long, long time. People like Brenda Baer, Sue and Kevin Watters. Sue Beckner and her brother David.

R: During dinner, who was it that called you from Australia?
G: Colleen Penchin. She was the wife of one of our math teachers who was here as an exchange teacher. She called to wish me luck and happiness.

R: How many people have worked for you over the years?
G: Almost a thousand kids have worked for me in 25 years. No matter where I go I’ll find someone that I know, or someone who knows somebody that I know. Just this fall I went on a pack trip with three other guys up in Canada. I started talking to one of the guys that was with us. He was an older gentleman, and he started naming off guys that I knew. So, it’s a small world, especially in the Adventist community.

R: Speaking of packing, are you still a horseman?
G: I love horsepacking. I try to go two to three, four times a year. I’ve been all over. I’ve been in Banff National Park five times and seen grizzly, moose, caribou, elk and deer. I’ve been up in Canada and the Wallowas a lot.

R: Do you still do cowboy camp meeting?
G: Every Fourth of July weekend we have a cowboy camp meeting. I helped start that. And I’ve been to every single one of them, the only one in the whole outfit that’s been to every one. We plan our vacation around our cowboy camp meeting. Horses have been a real blessing for our family. Our kids love to do them, and it’s been something we can do as a family.

R: So do you still say “boy howdy?”
G: Boy howdy! Cotton pick! (laughing)

R: Sorry! (laughing) I had throw that in there for those of us who remember your colorful expressions. Anyway, I always thought it was great that you were into horses. I remember you did a lot of riding during the summer. Do you still take your grounds crew on a summer trip?
G: No. We had to give that up. The kids have so many other interests. I mean I could get three or four, but not enough people would want to go to make it worth the effort.

R: In the past we had some great outings.
G: Yes we did. We’ve gone to Banff National Park, Lake Louise, Victoria, the Oregon Coast, Dworshak Dam—canoeing on the reservoir. We also went to Yellowstone and Glacier National Park. A lot of good times.

R: What are some of the differences you’ve seen in the students you’ve employed over the past 25 years?
G: Well, when I first started it seemed like we got more farm kids. More of the kids had experience working outside. And then the labor laws have changed such that younger kids can’t learn how to work. It’s a real challenge to teach them and we strive to do that.

R: What are the types of things you find yourself doing now to help them?
G: It’s more hands on than it used to be. I have to be with them to guide and show them how to do things. People haven’t driven tractors or they don’t know how to drive a truck or back out of a place using just mirrors. Things like that. I’ve had people that come that don’t even know how to drive a stick shift. But now our vehicles are automatics. We just let go of our last manual vehicle a couple of months ago.

R: What are some of the other major changes that have changed the way you work? For instance I remember the major transition to automatic sprinklers. Is there anyplace that there are not automatic sprinklers ?
G: Very few. Sittner Field does not have automatic sprinklers. Then there is the very west end of the P.E. field, but other than that everything is pretty well automatic.

R: That made a big difference hasn’t it?
G: It’s made a huge difference. It let me use my students elsewhere. For instance, we can put in more flowers. When I started I wanted to put in more color on campus so I put in big new landscape beds. That also helped with the mowing. Our big mowers can get in and zip around so we don’t have to do as much hand mowing.

R: How many thousands of flowers do you plant every year?
G: We put in twelve to 15,000 plants per year of annuals. The reason I use annuals is because they’re so colorful all summer long. Perennial are okay, and there are some beautiful perennial, but they just don’t last like the annuals do. Community people come up to me all the time and compliment us on how beautiful this campus is.

R: What’s been your favorite project--the one you’ve been most proud of during the time you’ve been here?
G: Probably Rosario. A few years ago we started the renovation project up there. I helped a lot with the infrastructure--putting sewer and water lines in. I also helped put the tanks in, build an RV park, logging to clear off lands, so we could put the drain field in. And we tore down buildings and cleaned up. I’d go over two weeks at a time and it took about three years. I was at Rosario part-time, plus I was running this crew over here at the same time so it was quite a challenge.

R: I imagine part of the reason you like going to Rosario is that you have a personal connection with it.
G: I do. I took biology in college and I spent a summer there. And once a person has spent some time at Rosario it becomes a part of you. The aura and the atmosphere are so unique. It’s a small enough group of students that are there, so you develop a real rapport with everyone there. You become like a family.

R: So after all these years, do you see that still happening with students that are there?
G: I do.

R: Now what about favorite projects on the main campus?
G: Some of my favorite projects have been building the parking lots and getting in landscapes. Every year we do something new to improve the campus landscape. There’s great satisfaction in taking something that’s seedy-looking and not so good and turning it into something of beauty. That’s a witness for this school.

R: What are some big projects you are working on right now?
G: We just finished new landscaping around Smith Hall and now we are working on the new parking lot behind the technology building. Our next big project will probably be new landscaping around Bowers Hall. And I’ve still got some more landscaping or plants to put in around the Fine Arts Center and Chan Shun here and there. We’ve had our moments of not such great things too. We lost a few trees out in the alumni parking lot. We got some fire blight that hadn’t been through in 60 or 70 years and it took a few of my trees out. So I’m going to have to replant those. It’s part of the challenge.

R: What’s the worst disaster that ever happened on campus here that you had to deal with?
G: I suppose Columbia Auditorium burning down. I was working on grounds at that time. I helped clean up. Even now we still have effects of the fire because some of the garbage was buried underneath the alumni lawn and its caused some sinking. That’s why you’ll see puddles up in some areas.

R: I was wondering about that because it’s usually the lawn I cut across to get to the main campus. Ooops... I know I’m not supposed to do that...
G: Now Rosa...

R: But I can’t help it. There’s no direct sidewalk from where I am. Well, enough of the disasters and people making paths across the nice lawns...What do you enjoy the most about your work?
G: It is been really fun working with the students. I enjoy the camaraderie we have. We have a good time here working and getting to know new people. There are those moments when you have to deal with somebody who isn’t doing what they’re supposed to, but overall, it’s really been a blessing.

R: I understand you have been kind of a father figure to some people and for one girl in particular. You participated in her wedding and, as they say, gave her
away.
G: That was a special moment. Being able to help her grow and get her life turned around, get her through school and now she’s a professor.

R: That’s great. Any other people that you feel as if you’ve been blessed to be able to help in some way?
G: Yes, there was Steve Arrell. He was an older guy and had a family. Steve had led a rough life. He was a rock musician and had been into drugs and alcohol. I met him through one of my old academy teachers who one day called me up and said ‘Hey, I’ve got a guy that just been baptized two weeks ago and he needs a job. He wants to come be a teacher.’ I said sure, send him by. And so I put him out to work.
For his first job I sent him to go hoe some weeds out of a softball field. I gave him a hoe and few minutes later, he comes back with two pieces of hoe. (laughs)
  So, I thought, well that didn’t work. So I showed him how to use it a little better and sent him out again with a new hoe. He came back again with two pieces of hoe. The poor guy had blisters on his hands. Steve was used to making 75 to 80 bucks an hour as a hypnotist therapist and then he came to work for me for four bucks and hour, or something like that.

R: A humbling change.
G: It must have been really a low blow. Anyway, I ended up finally giving him a shovel. I knew he couldn’t break that. (laughs) He finally got the job done.

R: Any other Steve stories?
G: Another time, I had him on the tractor that had a lawnmower behind it. He was mowing at Walla Walla Valley Academy. I stepped up to talk to him, putting my foot just right in front of the tire. He had had his foot on the clutch but hadn’t taken it out of gear. When I was talking to him his foot slipped off the clutch and of course it freaked him out and he slammed on the clutch and there he sits--the back tires of the tractor right on my toes.

R: Did he know that the tire was on your foot?
G: Yeah, he did. He was fumbling around so he killed the motor and had start it up again. When Steve died his wife asked me to tell that story at his eulogy. It was a real privilege to be able to go and tell people what Steve meant, because he meant a lot to me. That’s the thing about these students. They change my life. Every single student changes my life. Even as I maybe change their lives. I enjoy enjoy helping them. They just mean something special to me.

R: Steve did finish school, right?
G: Steve graduated with a degree and became a teacher. He taught at Stateline School and then went to teach at a public school in Portland. One day he woke up, sat up in bed and had a heart attack and died. He had only been out of college about 10 years.

R: In that time we just don’t know how many people he affected.
G: That’s right. I know he sure helped some of the students he worked with right here. He could relate to some of them in ways that I couldn’t relate to.

R: That’s right. And he was extremely funny. I remember his stories which still make me laugh when I think about them.
G: Oh, he was just a card. He always had us in stitches. I will never forget him. Whenever you come in contact with somebody, when you actually get to really know people, they become a part of you.

R: Well, as always, you never seem to lose your enthusiasm for your work.
G: No, I love my work. It’s a challenge everyday and it’s fun. I couldn’t think of anything I’d rather do.

Note: Want to send Gene a message? Send an e-mail to jacoge@wwc.edu

 

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