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Good teachers, good friends LeRoy Annis by Stacey Wilson '96 LeRoy Annis is the first to admit he’s not very good at keeping in touch, but that doesn’t stop alumni from writing to him with thanks for what he taught. “I guess it’s a reminder that once in a while you actually did get something across to your students,” he says. To anyone who had the privilege of studying English with Annis during his 29 years at Puget Sound , that is the understatement of the year. His “Freshman Writing Seminar” courses were equal parts fear and inspiration; the “Russian Novelists” (his favorite) was, shall we say, intense, and his Shakespeare lectures were unforgettable theatrical experiences that, by one account, “felt like the play was actually happening before your eyes. It was magic.” He was the professor who expected—and gave you—the world. But you had to earn it. For students who had the double pleasure of surviving Annis’ “Winter Survival Skills” Winterim course, the annual 22-day mountain trek he led from 1974 to 1984, the imprint he left was often life-changing. Those lucky students will have the chance to reconnect with Annis at Homecoming this fall at a special reunion for Winterim alumni and faculty. And no doubt there will be talk of some very real survival-of-the-fittest moments. (But we’ll get to that shortly.) Born in Kansas , Annis and his family left the Dust Bowl for the greener pastures of Chehalis, Wash., when he was 8 years old. As an adult, Annis moved to Everett to take a job with Weyerhaeuser, then enrolled at the University of Washington. Despite his job, a family of his own, and a 60-mile commute to take classes, he graduated Phi Beta Kappa. He earned his master’s and doctorate in English at UW, also, and taught there for seven years. He arrived at Puget Sound in 1966 during a time he calls “the revolution.” He admits he was often at odds with the college administration, and maybe not the most popular guy on campus. But Annis cannot deny his motivation—that force that pushed him through nearly 30 years of King Lear. “If it weren’t for students, I wouldn’t have stayed in the profession. Teaching freshmen and sophomores was exhilarating. They were fresh and alive. Extremely uplifting.” A self-professed man of the wilderness (his nickname is “The Bear”), Annis became the Winter Survival Skills leader in 1974 and exposed groups of 10 or so students to the dangerous beauty of the Northwest wilderness. After training together on weekends during the fall, the groups convened in January to hike 10,000-foot mountains in Oregon and Washington in temperatures that dipped to 10 below, wearing backpacks weighing up to 113 pounds. They slept on ice, averted avalanches, suffered from frostbitten feet, and got lost on an almost daily basis. It was survival with a capital S. Winter Skills alumnus Brian Reagan ’82, remembers getting lost with Annis on more than a few occasions. These moments, he says, were some of the most frightening and valuable of his college career. “LeRoy always used our ‘confusion’—he would never say we were ‘lost’—as a metaphor for life,” says Reagan, a San Francisco business owner. “I have 30 employees today and still use the principles of leadership that LeRoy taught me. Calmness, fortitude, and the idea that even in the worst blizzard, the sun will always shine another day.” Annis still hikes the mountains often, usually alone. “The wilderness is my religion,” he says. He also reserves plenty of time for walks around University Place with June, his wife of 55 years and a 1973 UPS graduate, and weekly chats with his good friend and former colleague Frank Cousens, who retired from the Puget Sound faculty in 1998. Mostly, though, he says he’s trying not to do much these days, and that includes writing a book. “My family is always pressuring me to finish my projects,” says Annis. “But there’s already too much silliness in libraries.” Write to Professor Annis at 4227 Alturus Street W., University Place, WA 98466, or leannis@msn.com. |
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