For over 60 years, Bob Smawley was “Mr. WSU” as he served as a volunteer and staff member at Washington State University, mentored thousands of students, and shared his life with his community of Pullman as well as his family.
Bob Smawley ’52, “Mr. WSU” to many generations of Cougs, presented thousands of his famous slideshows that educated and entertained everyone from student groups to retiring University presidents and regents.
Above is a 47-minute history of WSU told through pictures from 1890 up to the 2000s. The presentation covers major happenings from Rose Bowl appearances and the Martin Stadium fire, to WSU traditions like “Hello Walk” and ringing the Victory Bell. It replicates one of the slideshow presentations that Smawley gave on many occasions at WSU.
Smawley’s audio was recorded at WSU’s MASC (Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections) in 2005.
Courtesy WSU » More …
Someone forgot about the fruit salad. When the refrigerator door opens, the sickly sweet aroma delivers a potent reminder. All the rotting apples, pears, and bananas in the bowl will need to be thrown out, and hopefully composted. It may seem insignificant, but that fruit salad represents a piece of the 40 percent of food wasted in the United States, about 20 pounds per person each month.
In recent years, food waste in this country and many other places around the world has grown not only in volume, but also in the collective consciousness. The numbers are staggering. Americans throw away an estimated $165 billion … » More …
Rooted in World War I lore, and popularized with dramatic references in books and TV shows, military challenge coins have become a powerful symbol of camaraderie and support.
Beginning this spring, they also will help recognize the sacrifice and determination of student veterans at Washington State University. The newly minted WSU challenge coins will be handed out to all graduating veterans, and to faculty and staff with military service.
“This was one of our first projects,” says WSU Veterans Coordinator Blaine Golden, noting the expanded student Veterans Center opened in 2014. “We wanted something that would show veterans we value their contributions…and are proud … » More …
The massive Oso landslide killed 43 people, caused extensive flooding, and destroyed a key highway north of Everett in 2014, pushing the communities of Arlington and Darrington to their breaking point.
For months, grieving residents and community leaders remained so immersed in the search and recovery demands that nearly everything else had to be put on hold. That’s why, when they were invited to participate in a national competition that could funnel up to $3 million or more toward desperately needed economic revitalization efforts, Arlington Mayor Barb Tolbert was practically on the verge of tears, again.
“It was this rare opportunity but we had no … » More …
In the summer of 1936, Randall Johnson, a fine arts student at Washington State College, designed a simple logo for the college to paint on a facilities truck. The cougar head logo, drawn in honor of Butch the Cougar, rapidly gained popularity and 75 years later represents one of the most recognizable symbols of a university or college in the U.S., if not the world.
Imagine Tomorrow
Flushing the toilet stirred up a good idea in four young women from Walla Walla High School. They recognized that families use hundreds of gallons of water per day, a real problem in places faced with water shortages. To ease that, Karen Maldonado, Edlyn Carvajal, Sandra Escobedo de la Cruz, and Ruth Garcia developed a trapping system using an inexpensive charcoal filter to recycle wastewater back to the toilet tank.
The Walla Walla teens took their plan to the Alaska Airlines Imagine Tomorrow competition, an annual problem-solving challenge at Washington State University that encourages high school students to propose and present ideas … » More …
“I do not believe that any man can adequately appreciate the world of to-day unless he has some knowledge of … the history of the world of the past.” —Theodore Roosevelt, 1911
A hundred years ago, Theodore Roosevelt’s vision of conservation came to fruition with the establishment of the National Park Service. Although President Woodrow Wilson established the NPS, Roosevelt had doubled the number of national parks and passed the Antiquities Act in 1906 when he was in the Oval Office. Roosevelt believed that we must have a deeper and longer-term view of our country’s natural and historical heritage.
In the spirit of Roosevelt’s aims, … » More …
Elson S. Floyd Cultural Center
Former WSU President Elson S. Floyd pulled together a group of campus leaders in late 2014 to sketch out a vision of a new kind of building on campus: a place for cultural education and events. Although Floyd died in 2015, the Elson S. Floyd Cultural Center, under construction on the corner of Stadium and Main, will be a signature welcome to WSU with a “rolling hills” roof and open design.
Maria de Jesus Dixon, manager of operations for the Cultural Center, believes the center is unique among the nation’s universities and colleges. WSU’s multicultural student population has grown … » More …
Kirk and Noel Schulz packed up their 25-foot, silver Airstream trailer in early June, and hit the road from Manhattan, Kansas. Kirk H. Schulz had just concluded seven successful years as president of Kansas State University. The journey to Washington State University—where he will take the reins as president, and Noel will join the engineering faculty—provided a time to reflect on careers of serving higher education, especially at land-grant universities like WSU.
They hung a Cougar flag on the Airstream when they camped at Rocky Mountain National Park and elsewhere along the way, getting ready to join the WSU community. However, this wasn’t the first … » More …