{"id":4094,"date":"2015-03-03T18:06:25","date_gmt":"2015-03-03T23:06:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.archives.nd.edu\/about\/news\/?p=4094"},"modified":"2015-03-03T18:06:25","modified_gmt":"2015-03-03T23:06:25","slug":"hesburgh-eulogy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/hesburgh-eulogy\/","title":{"rendered":"An Archivist’s Eulogy for Father Hesburgh"},"content":{"rendered":" <\/a>
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\"Rev.
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, CSC, and University Archivist Wendy Clauson Schlereth posing in the University Archives with the academic hoods given to Fr. Hesburgh along with honorary degrees, 1982.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I mourn the passing of Father Ted in a deeply personal as well as professional way.<\/p>\n

In 1978, when I was an ambitious but still young archivist, he believed in me enough to give me the chance to be University Archivist, passing over others who on paper looked to be far more qualified at that point in time than I was.\u00a0 I had little doubt, of course, that I was equipped to do the job, but I think Father Ted\u2019s choice startled more than a few.\u00a0 He could, and did, take those kinds of chances when it came to people.\u00a0 Because it wasn\u2019t just who you were on paper that mattered to him, it was who he believed you to be, and perhaps more importantly what you were capable of becoming that was most important. Father Ted inspired so many of us to become all that he saw in us, even when others may have been more short sighted.<\/p>\n

I had the privilege of participating in one of the early \u201cFly-In\u201d weekends here at Notre Dame, probably in the mid to late \u201870s, when very wealthy potential donors were brought to campus for a very special set of events.\u00a0 The intent, of course, was to engage them to the point they would make a substantial financial commitment to the University.\u00a0 Everything about the weekend was top drawer, but what impressed me the most was what happened at the Saturday night dinner.\u00a0 After a rather lavish meal, served on the 14th floor of the Memorial Library, everyone pushed back from their tables and relocated themselves in comfortable seating with brandies in hand.\u00a0 Father Ted lit a cigar and proceeded to share his vision for what Notre Dame had the potential to become. As his smoke slowly circled above him, I watched his audience become totally mesmerized.\u00a0 His effect on everyone in the room was palpable.\u00a0 I\u2019d never seen anything like it and will never forget it.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not sure Father Ted\u2019s charisma was as evident in large public settings as it was privately, although surely he was a master of the public event.\u00a0 But in private, I think it was probably near impossible to refuse anything he asked of you. The paradox here is he mostly didn\u2019t ask.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t have to.\u00a0 You knew.<\/p>\n

Father Ted knew how to bind people to a shared vision, of intellectual community, of religious commitment, of personal, moral integrity. He was the consummate leader. \u00a0He never micro-managed: if he had enough confidence in you to give you a job, he respected your professional competence and gave you the freedom to get the job done.\u00a0 Importantly, he also provided you with the resources you\u2019d need to succeed.<\/p>\n

Father Ted gave as generously as he took.\u00a0 The support he gave me, personally, and the Archives that he entrusted to my care, spanned all the years I served him and this university. He used his many personal contacts to solicit collections to enrich our holdings. The door to his office was always open to me, for advice and counsel, for assistance. He gave me enormous freedom to make judgment calls on access to information, relying on the fact I also knew when to defer a decision and kick an issue upstairs.\u00a0 \u00a0I never left his office without also receiving his prayers and blessings. \u00a0\u00a0In 1986, as his presidency was winding down, he surprised me and my husband with a Special Presidential Award. He called it a \u201ctwo-fer,\u201d to recognize two historians who had committed their professional lives to Notre Dame. But I knew, for my part, it was also his way of telling me our job together was not done when he left office. Remember what I said about binding.<\/p>\n

The University Archives was really transformed by Father Ted\u2019s sense of history and the path upon which he propelled us. Anyone who knew him knew he had a strong sense of his own place in history, but that place was as one player amongst many, one point in time along a continuum. \u00a0His support of the Archives did not begin with me, and our dynamic was certainly different than what he experienced with my immediate two predecessors, two Holy Cross priests, who were the only other University Archivists during Father Ted\u2019s tenure as president.\u00a0 In 1952, when Father Ted took office as president, Father Tom McAvoy had been University Archivist since 1929.\u00a0 A formidable figure within the Community, he embodied all things having to do with history on campus, and by all accounts on occasion was a thorn in Father Ted\u2019s side. When Father Tom Blantz succeeded him, upon Father McAvoy\u2019s death in 1969, Father Ted now had an Archivist whose gentle and unassuming style could not have been in greater contrast to the man he replaced.\u00a0 What unified these three men, however, was a common past and present, of Community and of the University.\u00a0 The history in the Archives was theirs.<\/p>\n

When I came along, I was different. \u00a0I was young, I was a lay person, I was a married woman. \u00a0Many thought any one of those factors could have disqualified me from consideration for the particular administrative position at Notre Dame that I wanted, and wanted badly.\u00a0 But they didn\u2019t, not singly or collectively.\u00a0 I was offered the opportunity to take responsibility for an operation with a reputation for excellence, and to take it to the next level.\u00a0 \u00a0I have always believed my appointment by Father Ted was evidence of not only how much he valued the past, but how willing he was to break from it if he thought it was the right thing to do.\u00a0 It was made absolutely clear to me that I was Father Ted\u2019s choice as University Archivist, it was his decision and his alone, and that I would \u201cserve at the pleasure of the President.\u201d<\/p>\n

For me, it has, indeed, been a pleasure. I trust I have served him well and never gave him cause to regret his decision. He will be sorely missed.<\/p>\n

Wendy Clauson Schlereth
\nUniversity Archivist
\nFebruary 26, 2015<\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n

A selection of favorite photos of Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh
\nchosen by\u00a0the Notre Dame Archives’ staff:<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\"Portrait
Portrait of Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, CSC, outside with the Main Building Dome in the background, May 1980.
Photo by Bruce Harlan.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Copy
Copy of a page from Father Hesburgh’s baby book, 1917.
“Baby’s Name is Theodore Martin Hesburgh, being named for his father and Grandpa – and here’s hoping he will be as good and noble as they are.”<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Copy
Copy of a page from Father Hesburgh’s baby book, 1917.
“Important Events: Baby was born at the Crouse-Irving Hospital – Syracuse, NY on Friday, May 25th, 1917 at 11:45 a.m. – the doctor being Dr. Frank McMarrow. He weighed nine pounds and looked like a little rosebud. Mother was so glad God sent her a little boy, for sister would be so glad when she grew up to have a big brother. Daddy was so happy – his face looked like a morning in June.”<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh as a baby with his older sister Mary, 1918. Photo by Fairbanks.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Rev.
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, CSC (second from left), as a seminary student, with other students, in front of Holy Cross Hall in winter with snow, 1935. The 1934-1935 school year was Hesburgh’s first at Notre Dame.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Rev.
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh in cold-weather gear while visiting the South Pole (Antarctica) in November 1962 as Chairman of the National Science Board’s International Science Activities Committee.
US Navy photograph, taken by Photographer’s Mate Chief (PhC) Frank Kazukaistis, USN.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"University
University of Southern California (USC) Commencement – USC President Norman H. Topping adjusting John Wayne’s academic robes while Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh looks on, 1968\/0606.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Rev.
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh at an unidentified wedding reception, c1965.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"ootball
Football Game Day – Notre Dame vs. Purdue, 1953\/1002. Laetare Medalist Irene Dunne (center) watching the game in the stands with Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh and Ella Morris.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"United
United States Civil Rights Commission members at Land O’Lakes, Wisconsin, July 1966.
Back row: Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, unidentified, Robert S. Rankin
Front row: Erwin Griswold, Frankie Muse Freeman, John A. Hannah, unidentified<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Rev.
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, CSC, fishing near Notre Dame’s remote conference center near Land O’Lakes, Wisconsin, c1980.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Rev.
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, surrounded by a group of women, standing on a dock with fishing poles and a pile of caught fish, c1975.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Rev.
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh walking with members of the Student Government, December 1970. The student on the far right is Dave Krashna, Student Body President. The middle student is unidentified and the student next to Hesburgh is Mark Winings, Student Body Vice President.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Commencement
Commencement – Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini sitting in the back seat of a car at Notre Dame, 1960\/0605.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Rev.
Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh holding up a chalice during Mass in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, 1961.
Photo by Paul Fusco, LOOK Magazine [published in LOOK Magazine, 10\/24\/1961]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" <\/a>
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I mourn the passing of Father Ted in a deeply personal as well as professional way. In 1978, when I was an ambitious but still young archivist, he believed in me enough to give me the chance to be University Archivist, passing over others who on paper looked to be far more qualified at that … Continue reading “An Archivist’s Eulogy for Father Hesburgh”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n ","protected":false},"author":4370,"featured_media":4115,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[39],"class_list":["post-4094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nd-history","tag-hesburgh"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-25 11:29:59","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4370"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4115"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.nd.edu\/ndarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}