By Dr. Mary Wilkins-Jordan
Ruth Litke stopped by the Library, and her husband, Ray Litke, recently died, and he had been a student here back in 1959, using his GI Bill money. His instructor was Bob Madison, in case his name is familiar. Ray was apparently very happy with his education here, and kept his textbooks. For 25 years, he was the Building Maintenance Supervisor at St. Cloud State, and he also built three houses and two cabins. Ray had saved his books all these years, and Ruth was concerned that they might be just thrown out.
So, she reached out to the library to see if we might be able to find a good home for them. We talked about a couple of different options, but the best one happened: we sent the books to the Carpentry department, so they have returned home! If you have been in that wing of the school – and you should find a reason to go check it out if you haven’t checked it out yet – you know there are a lot of interesting displays, both current work and historic. Ray’s books are finding a home there, continuing to inspire students to do some big, interesting things with the information they learned at SCTCC.
In addition to encouraging you to check out Carpentry – this is a good reminder that you may not know how much you are inspiring someone else. Today, you might have inspired someone to keep struggling forward with their classwork, or to try something new, or to make a big change in their life. You may never know about it – but maybe it’s a good idea to keep remembering that every day you are an example to others. And, it would be excellent to inspire other people to succeed at SCTCC and beyond.
Stop by the library to find all kinds of things that might help to inspire you!