Charles Conaway

After graduating from JaxState -- 3 years was enough with Summers and overloads -- I came to FSU for a master's in Library Science. I worked in south Florida for about 3 years to pay off my debts, then went "up Nawth" to take my doctorate in Information Science in 1974 at Rutgers and went to work at SUNY/Buffalo. My skill set at that time was in high demand, and I had my first Fulbright teaching at the University of Iceland, with my new wife and "inherited" daughter. Back to Buffalo until the infamous Blizzard of '77. I was in Oklahoma and when I shoveled my VW van out of the airport and got home, Fran greeted me with some-thing approaching an ultimatum: Find a job where I never get snowed on again or maybe we'll make our own arrangements! I immediately saw the wisdom of her advice, and as I'd been away for more than a decade, I came back to Tallahassee and FSU in '77 and we immediately had another daughter. I taught until I retired in 2002 and with skills kept current, I had another Fulbright in Jamaica, taught a couple of summers in Puerto Rico, with short term consulting jobs elsewhere in the Caribbean, Central and South America and a few others in Europe and helped Kuwait rebuild its information system after the Iraqi invasion was overturned. So, I had the right skills at the right time and freedom to work pretty much wherever I was wanted during summers. We had, and continue to have, good health and have since even had chances to travel to all the continents. We continue to be intellectually and socially engaged and love our community.

The daughters -- now 50 and 40 -- are doing well in Manhattan and the San Francisco area. Looking at a map, it would seem we've maximized the distance between ourselves, but in fact get we along very well! I had to wait until I was 70 before our first and only grandchild, Charlie, was born, but we still get to see him fairly frequently.

Just happens, yesterday I discovered Ross Jones (HHS '61), and I had a pleasant lunch with him and his wife, (Butler HS '61), up in Thomasville GA and he told me I should look for "y'all" on the Web, thus my getting back in touch. Please let me know when our 60th reunion will be as I hope to catch up with all the rest of us who've made it this far! Regards to all, === Chas.

My family pretty much fell apart in my Sophomore year and things were difficult. I clerked at the Madison County Board of Registrars but couldn't stand the way they behaved toward our Black citizens (and tax-payers) who had the temerity to try to register to vote, so found a job at the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library which was (somewhat) better. I worked there 6 nights a week from 5 until 9, so largely missed out on HHS activities -- never attending a football game, or being involved in club activities, and attending very few dances or parties. So, I largely missed out on the social system at my school.