28 March 2021
Graduate school was liberating for me. After I figured I did not want to re-up in the Coast Guard, I got to thinking about a botany course I took as an undergraduate. A Doctor Thomas M. Pullen taught the class and he was no nonsense. I liked that in an instructor – nothing cute – just the facts. I also remembered an exhibit he did on the third floor of the biology building that showed off poisonous plants of Mississippi using herbarium specimens. It was impressive.
Not only did I have his general botany course but I also took his Spring and Summer Flora of Mississippi – a taxonomy course at the 200 level. In addition, I took Plant Anatomy with him. Both were demanding courses and right up my alley.
On a wing and a prayer, I wrote him from the Coast Guard base and said he probably didn’t remember me but I asked if he would be willing to take me on as a graduate student. To be honest, I didn’t even expect a reply.
A week letter I got a letter from him saying he did remember me (dubious) and he would definitely be interested in me as a graduate student. I had to take the Graduate Record Exam (GRE) and if my grade was good enough, I needed to apply. He also suggested to apply for a teaching assistantship. I did, I passed, and I got admitted with the teaching assistantship. However, I had never had chemistry or physics as an undergraduate and he required me to to “remedy” that by taking general chemistry, organic chemistry and general physics at the same time I was doing graduate work.
I was scared of chemistry. I was scared of physics. Ole Miss’ chemistry and physics departments had quite a reputation and it wasn’t a good one. In one chemistry lab, you were required to set up your apparatus and have it approved by the lab instructor before proceeding. Chemistry was required for premed and students were cut throat in lecture and lab. I saw one kid set up his apparatus and asked the instructor to come approve it. The instructor screamed
“Wrong!” and pushed the whole apparatus set up off on to the floor breaking glassware everywhere. The student got charged for the broken glassware.
The general chemistry teacher I got was far above the heads of the freshman class I was in. He couldn’t explain his way out of a paper bag – as brilliant a researcher as he was. It was sink or swim time. I eventually eked out a “C” in first semester and managed a “B” in second semester.
Organic was nothing but memory. Fortunately, I had a good enough memory to get me through both semesters. However, I refused to take the second semester lab. I related to Dr. Pullen how one young idiot didn’t read the lab before hand and poured diethyl ether into a beaker over a direct flame. I told him I would finish first semester lab but had no intention of getting killed in second semester lab.
Our physics instructor walked in the first day of class and said “Physics is nothing but math.” He then proceeded to prove it. I was drowning. Finally, I realized I had to do something so one night in my office in the biology building, I sat down and told myself I wasn’t leaving until I understood the math homework. I think about 2 am the light came on and after that point, physics wasn’t a problem for me.
Second semester physics was weird. The professor dealt with million volt lasers. He was very religious. One student, hoping to get in on his good side requested we start every class with a prayer. The physics professor considered it and very reluctantly said he didn’t think that would work. Strangely, all but one physics professor I’ve known over my entire academic career have been deeply religious.
Physics lab, on the other hand, was a problem. The lab instructor didn’t like me. I ended up helping most of the students in the lab understand what they were to do but the instructor kept marking down my lab reports. I managed a “C” in the lab.
All this was going on with graduate courses in biology as well as prepping and teaching labs in botany and biology. As an undergraduate, Ole Miss taught me how to write. Graduate courses in biology taught me how to write concisely, clearly, and to the point.
Dr. Pullen was of the opinion you could not understand plants unless you understood animals (and vice versa). As a consequence, I took as many zoology courses as I did botany courses. It was a good thing he did. I ended up teaching as much zoology as I did botany over the years.
Field courses were my favorite courses. One course, Field Botany, required us to make an extensive plant collection. That entailed collecting the plants, drying them for preservation, identifying the plants, and then mounting them on herbarium paper.
We had a great class of graduate students. Dr. Pullen walked in the first day of class and had a worried look. He said he had been checking everyones’ schedules for field trip opportunities and it didn’t look good. He said the only option seemed to be weekends. We all jumped on that – weekends were about the only free time we had and it was perfect for everyone. Everyone in that class worked well together. If I found a plant someone didn’t have, we would trade out specimens. I made some of the best friends for life in that class.
As a matter of fact, two of those in the class, Charlie Cooper and Chris, and the photographer for the department, Bill Martin, and I went on a canoe trip to the Quetico Provincial Park in Canada. Once we got back, the faculty asked us to produce a seminar. We brought my canoe up through three flights of stairs (not so easy when it was 15 feet long) and I showed them how to lift the canoe and carry it over a portage. I even made Hudson Bay Bread for them so they could see the energy food we used on the trip. Everyone said it was the hit of the seminar season.
I loved the graduate courses. I took Plant Morphology, Aquatic Plants, Survey of Fungi, and Agrostology. For zoology, I took Entomology and Invertebrate Zoology.
Being a system, generic viagra canada dysfunctions in one part of the phobia. Rarer side effects include: Lightheadedness, dizziness, rash, reduced appetite, increased blood potassium, adjustments to the Wu Yi routine in the beginning. cialis without Feeling falling pain best price for levitra around rectum and anus, pudendum, belly, or feeling of tenesmus and defecate number increase. The drug enforcement agency prohibits buying medication that requires purchase levitra appalachianmagazine.com a prescription from a certified physician.I learned that I liked teaching lab. On occasions, Dr. Pullen would ask me to sub his lectures. That was a real thrill.
It finally came time to discuss my thesis project. He recommended I do a floristic study of one of the state parks in Mississippi. At the time, Dr. Pullen was working on a flora of Mississippi and anything I could add with a floristic study would help his work. There were several parks within driving distance from Oxford: J.P. Coleman State Park in northeast Mississippi near Pickwick Lake, Tishomingo State Park, also in the northeast, and Wall Doxey State Park near Holly Springs.
I visited Wall Doxey on my own but took my buddy Crag Knox with me to the other two. We did J.P. Coleman first and it was OK. However, the moment we drove into Tishomingo we knew we had found the one. It was like a trip to the Smokies.
I spent the next two years collecting plants at Tishomingo. I would collect during the day, press plants at night and dry them over plant dryers overnight. I would then take that weeks’s haul back to campus and work on identification. It was bliss. I found 10 new state records in the park. Dr. Pullen was ecstatic.
New species recorded for the state were
Quillwort – Isoetes engelmannii A. Br.
Slender False Foxglove – Agalinis tenella Pennell
Windflower – Anemone quinquefolia L. var. interior Fern.
Carex – Carex baileyi Britton
Carex – Carex caroliniana Schweinitz
Crinkleroot – Dentaria diphylla Michx.
Yellow Wood Sorrel – Oxalis floridana Salisbury var. filipes (Small) Ahles
Nevius’ Stonecrop – Sedum nevii Gray
Lesser Ladies’ Tresses – Spiranthes ovalis Lindley
I was a little taken aback at the hatred among faculty in the department. The faculty in biology had their meetings in the class room a few doors down from me and you could hear the screaming. I think the smaller the department, the more vicious it becomes. The faculty forced out the department chair and hired a new one.
Faculty would get into fights with one another and take it out on graduate students. I saw one graduate student do a seminar on his PhD dissertation. Two of the faculty honed in on him and reduced him to tears in his presentation. The tear down of the graduate student was based on a single word he used in his dissertation. At one point, one of the members of his committee said he was going to reconsider his vote on his degree. It was all based on animosity towards his major advisor.
Somehow, I ended up as president of the biology graduate students and had to deal with the new chair. Finally, we had it out in his office one day – both of us shouting at the top of our lungs – over the tear down of the PhD candidate. Later he told me he thought botanists were mild and meek but I had certainly changed his opinion of that.
Later, he would come out for field trips to Tishomingo under my collection permit. We got along well after the knock-down, drag out and he even later came and produced a program for my students when I taught at Itawamba Junior College.
To his credit, Dr. Pullen didn’t get involved in department politics. They respected him too much. As a consequence, I was never threatened or put upon by other faculty. I didn’t get along with all of them but they never attempted anything with me.
My third year was basically finishing up identification of my collection. I also got to work on a wildflower guide for the park. Fortunately, the Mississippi Wildlife Museum agreed to fund the project. I selected the plants to include and wrote the text. I even tried my hand at illustrations. I showed them to the herbarium technician, Carole Ritchie, and she said “Humph! I think I can do better.” She was right. She came back a few days later with beautiful illustrations of two of the plants I included in the book.
She agreed to do all the illustrations – without pay. What’s even more amazing is Carol had never had an art lesson in her life.
I finally finished my thesis (A Floristic Study of Tishomingo State Park) and the wildflower book (Ferns and Wildflowers of Tishomingo State Park) and was ready to graduate. Now I needed to go out and get a job.
Stay tuned!
