Oral History Project

Watch out for the full story in the Spring '06 issue of  Smith Business magazine

Making Memories

Joe Fitzpatrick ’49 was a Marine stationed in the South Pacific during World War II. Of the 72 young men in his platoon, only four survived to return to their homes and families. Fitzpatrick was a radio navigator/gunner on a two-man bomber plane, the Curtis-Wright Helldiver, until he broke his ankle. At that point he was sent home by ship. Six days out from San Diego, the ship ran out of food, so Fitzpatrick and the other Marines on board ate nothing but pancakes and sorghum for six days. When he was discharged, he came home and entered the business school at the University of Maryland.

Fitzpatrick died last fall, but his stories about the war and the university are now collected in the Smith School’s video archives as part of an unusual oral history project sponsored by his son, Terry Fitzpatrick ’75. As part of the project, students in the University of Maryland’s College Park Scholars program videotaped interviews with three World War II veterans who came to the University of Maryland under the G.I. Bill. Joseph Fitzpatrick ’49, Ambrose Klotz ’55, and Alvin Lann ’58 spent an afternoon with the Scholars downloading their memories of the University of Maryland in the post-World-War-II years.

Listening to the videotaped interviews gives one a sense of each man’s experiences on campus. Alvin Lann played basketball; Joe Fitzpatrick played baseball; Ambrose Klotz never even attended a sports event on campus. Lann went on to retail management, Fitzpatrick to a career in sales and printing, and Klotz to be a top-level manager in the federal government. But all of them say their education wouldn’t have been possible without the GI Bill.

The U.S. government passed the G.I. Bill in part to forestall the millions of young men and women who were leaving military after World War II from flooding the job market and driving up unemployment while the national economy adjusted to post-war conditions. The Bill paid for a veteran’s tuition and books and included a small stipend that helped defray their living expenses. In 1947, half of the country’s college students were veterans.

“The GI Bill was the greatest thing that ever happened to me besides marriage,” said Fitzpatrick in the video interview. “I never had an inkling I would ever go to college. My father went to work at 13 without a high school education, and my mother never went to high school. Being the oldest boy, there was very little chance that I’d ever go to college. Going to college gave me a whole different approach to life, for which I’m eternally grateful.”

The university made a great effort to accommodate ex-servicemen. When he came to Maryland, it had been five years since Fitzpatrick last looked at a textbook; he says he wouldn’t have made it through accounting without the tutoring he got from student tutors. Ambrose Klotz didn’t do anything on campus but take classes, because he also worked at a local grocery to provide for his wife and growing young family. “The University of Maryland went out of its way to help veterans succeed,” said Klotz. “My first child was born during finals week my freshman year, and my professors all made allowances. They treated veterans very well.”

University life changed with so many veterans on campus. During Fitzpatrick’s years playing baseball for the university under the leadership of legendary coach H. Burton Shipley, the team was made up of Marine majors and Navy commanders, all over the age of 21. Combat experience and world travel made them self-confident, assured, and adults in every way, and they expected to be treated as such. This sometimes came as a surprise. “Poor Coach Shipley. The first trip [the baseball team] took was to Richmond. Stuffy Evans (a teammate) said, ‘Ship, they’re yours in the day, but at night they’re mine,’ and we went out and drank beer,” Fitzpatrick recounted.