I was a sociology major during my 3 years at Earlham and Bill Fuson became my advisor. Bill was a low key, patient and interesting teacher.

Here is how everyone felt about grades in Bill's classes. If you got a C it was really average and that was fine. If you got a B you were proud; a b plus was cause for celebration; an A minus actually made you revise your own self worth. Straight A's were few and far between and called humility and restraint--you were too competent to brag. The only person I know who got straight A's was my sister-in-law, Peg Schafer Cobine. Bill told me (around 1958) Peg was the best student he ever had.

I was a good student and a better intellect but Bill had to devote more time on my behalf because I was always in trouble. Those were the days of a Dean of Women (female of course) and Bill always took my part because he thought the transgressions were laughable (in every way).

Bill Fuson came to my wedding to William Schafer in Clear Creek Meeting House and had such kind things to say to us.

I left Earlham before graduating when my Bill got a job in the quad cities in Illinois. I finished my degree elsewhere.

Fifteen or twenty years later, when my Bill was teaching at Berea College in Kentucky, our daughter Amelia attended workshops led by Bill Fuson's brother Nelson, who was the idle of Quaker preteens.

Martha Quick Schafer '60

Fran and family,
Lucky were we Farbers/Nagles to live next door to you Fusons on College Avenue in the 60's. Bicycling everywhere, pick-up soccer games, faculty retreats with families, caroling from one end to the other at Christmas, the gentle rhythm of each Earlham year sectioned into 10-week trimesters. What great memories from that unique, wholesome, collegial place and time where we were lucky to be together. Our kindest thoughts to you and yours,

Cindy Farber-Soule '73

62 years ago I took one class from Prof. Fuson, Soc 101 or some such title. One day we came to class and on the blackboard was a message. "No class today. Am home practicing a couvade." Mrs Fuson was in labor so he had gone to practice the ancient ritual of men taking to their beds with much screeching and groaning while their wives were elsewhere quietly delivering the child. I cannot tell you one other thing about that class or anything else I learned, but I have never forgotten that nor him. Makes me smile to remember it.

Carolyn Newlin Marshall '49

I took my first Sociology class from Bill Fuson during my Freshman year and I was immediately hooked--I knew I would major in Sociology--and took several more classes from him, including independent study. He did a great job of making Sociology come alive!

Caroline Kerman Wildflower '68

During a sociology class with William M. Fuson, he suggested I explore the field of social work in his fall class, and I did. When the class ended in January 1953, I felt convinced that Social Work was the field meant for me. As this Leading became stronger, I knew I would soon have to choose whether to follow. This Leading felt connected to my spiritual journey. I considered graduating with a double major -- Religion and Sociology or Psychology -- but discovered that then I couldn't graduate in June.

I asked for a conference with Dr. Fuson. Do you think I could be accepted in the University of Indiana School of Social Work with a Religion major, I asked? I also wondered if I had enough classes in these other fields for the school to admit me in their graduate program; and whether I, with a record of civil disobedience, would be able to qualify for financial assistance. As I shared these thoughts with Dr. Fuson, I felt a look of doubt etch across my face. I can't answer your questions, Armin, but I do suggest that you apply for admission. Only then will you get your answers. He smiled, wished me well and ended the conference. I walked away with mixed feelings -- hope was one of them. I was not to be disappointed. The answers to my questions were yes, yes, and yes.

This is an excerpt from one of my memoirs in my book Sowing My Quaker Oats to be published this late fall. I am so sorry that Bill won't get to read it, I started as a freshman at Earlham in Sept 1946 after discharge from CPS in July '46. After an interruption of over two years, I returned to EC and graduated in 1953. Bill Fuson was tough, thorough, honest and inspiring. When I heard of his passing, I wept. I owe the direction my life has gone to Bill, my instructor and my friend.

Armin L. Saeger, Jr. '53

Dr. Fuson was my sociology professor. He made us think, work hard and to obtain a high standard of accomplishment. He helped form my philosophy of living that aided me in a lifetime career in social work and community work throughout the world. Thank you Dr. Fuson.

Marietta Bala (WEBB) '58

Bill and Helen visited me when I was a Peace Corps volunteer in Cayambe, a small town just north of Quito, Ecuador, a year or so after my graduation as a Sociology major from Earlham. As I walked with Bill around the town's outskirts, I recall him asking some little boys playing in the street, "Well, why aren't you in school?". The boys also very honestly and with equal precision replied, "Well, we're having fun."

Bill used words carefully, economically, and laced with subtle wit. His attention to continual improvement in his course work stayed with me as I often thought that Bill Fuson would never be satisfied with a routine, so why should I? It was Bill's value of continual, careful revisions in course material that gave me a base layer to use from Earlham onward.

Alfred Wood '68

I was a student of Bill's my freshman year, exploring the idea of majoring in Sociology. I had always received good grades for my writing, so I was shocked to receive this comment from Bill on a paper I wrote: "Katherine, you write very well; unfortunately you don't say anything." These words changed the course of my life, because they made me realize that my talent for spinning words and images effectively was meaningless unless I had something worth saying. I never told him how deeply and positively that single sentence affected me, but I'm now the "go-to" person at my high school when anyone wants to craft a written message to students, parents, or staff. Thank you, Bill, for steering me so well.

Kate Eason Power '76

Bill was my academic advisor during my 4 years at Earlham. He was always accessible, and he always listened to my needs. He has always been one of my memories as a college student. He made a positive mark on the students of Earlham during my tenure as a student. He gave his life to Earlham and its ideals. He will be missed.

Trixie Beller Heck '73

Thank you for this notice. I never had Bill as one of my professors during my years - 1946-47 and 1948-'51 but knew him fairly well as an advisor to our SCA club. He certainly was unique - one with lots of energy, talent, sharp intellect and wonderful sense of humor and wit. Earlham was fortunate have his capabilities in the college community.

Robert L. Sellars '51

Bill Fuson taught the anthropology classes that were included in the sociology major and Bill's classes inspired my lifelong avocation for anthropology. A decade after I graduated from Earlham, I assisted a husband and wife team of anthropologists who were doing research on Kapingamarangi Island in Micronesia. There I met a third anthropolgist whom I married a year later. It could be said that I have Bill Fusion to thank for introducing me to both Malinowski and my husband.

Betsy (Seth) Cochran Metzgar '74

Bill Fuson was my primary mentor at Earlham College in the 1960s. As a social scientist, he encouraged my continued interest in community organization within mixed ethnicity cultures by teaching me how to document accurately both manifest leadership practices in communities and latent leadership practices that are less obvious, but more effective in the generation of change. I worked a summer for the West Side Organization in Chicago during the turbulent Cicero anti-discrimination campaign. Saul Alinsky, founder of the Industrial Areas Organization, embodied Bill's principles of engaged interaction with all classes functioning in a locale. I saw his staff in action and was profoundly impressed.

Shortly after,I was invited to set up Head Start Elementary Education Programs under the auspices of the Alaskan Native Brotherhood, the State of Alaska, and the Presbyterian Mission Board. Although I worked many months on sparsely populated islands in the Prince of Wales Sound, the conflict between tribal governments and Seattle, Japanese, Russian fishing/oil corporations had mushroomed to open inflammation. I not only taught youth, but I attended many meetings in which angry factions debated the issues of tribal government versus state government. The criticism of Head Start in that day was its insistence that all primary learning was English-based. At no time did the English speaking State agencies see the worthiness of Tlinket, Haida, Athapaskan languages being integrated into primary, secondary education programs. I decided to interview a diversity of tribal spokespeople in the region, to better comprehend the debate. That four months of participating in the community conflicts, living and working with tribal activists, exposing myself to the dangers of ethnic , racial and political/ economic conflict -- I was shot at twice by hot-headed youth and the brakes of my van had been altered before I took a Tlinget medicine woman on a perilous excursion during which we nearly plunged off a cliff into the Pacific.

I wrote a book-length study about this experience and presented it to Bill as an independent research project. He spent extensive time reading it, improving its format and analysis. I worked on the study during my fall term, while I started a senior community study on Appalachian whites living outside of Richmond.

One day Bill stopped me as I biked across campus. "You really enjoy community work, don't you?" His eyes twinkled at my response. "I spent most of my childhood moving from town to city to country, with little time to know them. You've encouraged me to look, listen,dialogue, and integrate my daily experiences with neighbors, residents, newcomers, and elders into a vital community of traditions and change. That's made my life more meaningful and resilient.

Thank you, Bill, for teaching me the meaning of life-long learning." He blushed, adjusted his glasses and nodded. "It's been enjoyable. One thing though, keep a pocket dictionary on your body at all times. The words 'ethno' and 'ethos' don't mean the same thing." He smiled and walked on to his office. Bill Fuson was my mentor and a latent leader in the Earlham community, less known than a Dr. Trueblood, but to students struggling on their journey, a very valuable guide.

Bruce Kaiper '66

As a young assistant professor in the 1960's at first I found Bill's directness intimidating. But as I grew in experience with him, especially during my tenure as Earlham's president, I came to value highly his honesty, his directness in expressing it, and his real compassion.

Richard Wood

I am pleased to acknowledge my debt to a superb teacher. I was enthralled by Bill Fuson's class on Anthropology, which I took 62 years ago. It was eye-opening, and I have not hesitated to advise following generations to be sure to include Anthropology in their college careers as one of the "must" courses for a life time. Of course, others, who were not privileged to be in Bill Fuson's class, may not have benefited so profoundly as I and my contemporaries at Earlham.

A semester in his class on Urban Sociology also had a big impact on me --tempting me to switch majors- and I consider that a significant compliment coming from someone who was then a Physics major and later to become a Biophysicist.

Allen T. Ansevin '51

I had several classes with Bill Fuson: Sociology, Anthropology, Marriage and Family as well as the dreaded Statistics required for our Psych/Soc major but it was that class that later qualified me for better than anticipated job!

Bill and Helen Fuson started at Earlham in the Fall of '46 with our class. At that time Dr. Helen Finley was the campus physician with an office in the basement of the Old Earlham Hall. When Richard Kanost EC'49 and I asked to be married under the care of West Richmond Friends Meeting at the time Prof. Wm. Berry was Clerk, Bill and Helen Fuson were one of the couples who served on the Oversight Committee for our Wedding. A Friends wedding Oversight Committee counsels with the couple as a member of the clergy does in other religions. Particularly for that reason we kept in touch with Bill and Helen Fuson through the years -- visiting whenever we were back on campus at their home on College Avenue.

Bill usually attended our Class of '50 reunions so I would see him then,as well. I, too, had been born of missionary parents in China so we had that as a common interest. I was pleased to have have been able to visit with Bill Fuson in his room at Friends Fellowship Community two years ago.

Margaret Rinden Kanost '50

My first memory of Bill Fuson was of a discussion which he and Helen Fuson, his wife and a physician, asked me to join when I was new at Earlham . It was a discussion with some 15-20 students in Jones House on a Sunday afternoon about marriage and relations between the sexes. It was in 1957, over 50 years ago, and it is arresting to consider how radical things have changed since that time! Can one imagine a discussion at Earlham and most other colleges today on this topic, with the basic purpose being to discourage premarital sex? My purpose in recalling this memory, however, is to say how impressed I was with Bill and Helen, particularly their realism, their genuine concern for the students, and their commitment to Quaker values.

A few years later Bill and I began to work closely together as administrators, Bill in things related to the curriculum and I with faculty affairs. I learned to appreciate the quickness, perceptiveness and independence of Bill's mind, and again, the depth and strength of his commitment to Earlham's principles as a Quaker college. I learned much from him about administration and Quakerism. It was a privilege to be associated with him.

Joe Elmore

I was a sociology major and, therefore, had a lot of contact with Bill during my years at EC.

However, the biggest impression he left on me came after I graduated, while I was doing my Alternative Service as a conscientious objector.

I wrote to Bill about it and about how the state hospital ward in which I worked was a living laboratory of some of the things we talked about in class. I got a letter back in which he told me about his experiences, and, in true Bill Fuson form, he gave me a recommendation for further study!

Yes, Bill. I bought the book, and I read it! And you were right; it was a great adjunct to the living laboratory in which I was working.

Thom Remington '70

I wasn't exactly at the top of the sociology class I took from Bill but he brought me to my best because his expectations were high. Never a "hard bodies soft minds" sort of guy, Bill fostered an atmosphere of intellectual rigor you could sink your teeth into. Out of class he was warm and welcoming. Always there was a sharp sense of humor, often wry or ironic, perfect for the situation. Once while I was in his home waiting for a meeting he offered ways I might pass the time. "You may even read a textbook if you do it quietly" he said.

Rob Bird '74

A long time ago in 1972 at Earlham I got sick mentally, dropped out of college and ended up living with Gregory Stackhouse the son of Edith Stackhouse, a long time worker in the library at Earlham. In 1978 I lived briefly on College Ave. and ran into Bill who suggested forcefully that I had better start doing something with my life. Greg and I were doing something at his mother's house for 5-6 years, just doing our thing, I guess, but I really appreciated Bill looking out for me and remember the words of wisdom well until this day.

I was a sociology major at Earlham and took a number of courses under Bill Fuson. I will forever be grateful for Bill's kindness when I wanted to go home to Saipan and spend a term doing independent study. Bill supervised my project, and when a terrible typhoon devastated the island and I was at a loss over how to continue research, Bill calmly suggested that I write about disaster recovery. I did that, and learned so much. I will always have special aloha for Bill - he went above and beyond and did so gracefully, without any fuss. Mahalo (thank you) to Bill Fuson.

Karen Peacock '70

I was a student of Bill Fuson and remember him well. He was a good teacher. Perhaps my most vivid memory was the time I composed a dance called the "Fuson Furies" that enacted the frustrations of writing a paper for his class. I danced around a typewriter as I recall. This was presented on stage in Carpenter Hall as part of a dance program.

Carly (Toraya) Ayres '56

Bill had one of the sharpest minds I have ever encountered. He was a marvelously innovative teacher, although he understood that innovation was not a desirable goal itself, but something to be exercised when the standard methods weren't good enough. To assess student relationships for one of his classes, he asked people to list the students they would most like to have as table companions in the dining hall, getting their cooperation by promising that their wishes would be fulfilled to the extent possible.

During a racial crisis at Earlham, he offered a course in the "Sociology of Minority Groups, the only course of his I ever took. The college at the time had a policy of discouraging blacks and whites from dating each other, and even (less harshly) from dancing with each other. The rationale was that interracial dating would cause parents to send their daughters somewhere else. In class we designed a poll to see what students thought of this. One of the interesting byproducts was the discovery that, as Bill knew all along, nobody minded how races other than their own behaved --- i.e. even the most bigoted white responders did not object to blacks dating Japanese, and Asians had no problem with blacks dancing with Native Americans.

Ralph Caplan '49

Bill Fuson was my faculty advisor and a fine one indeed. He made sociology compellingly and interesting to me by his teachings and examples. I best remember his suggestions for four of us as Young Friends, and as an interracial group, venturing on an intervisitation through the South during the summer of 1960, including visiting his brother at Fisk University. I found his value system entirely compatible and inspiring. Earlham was a rich experience for me and he was one of the reasons.

Barbara Scott '60

I remember Bill Fuson as a gentle soul who cared so much for his students. He always wanted us to be the "best that we could be" and he worked tirelessly at helping us to achieve that end. While he was interested in our academic pursuits, he cared even more about our personal journey. He loved Earlham and all that the institution stood and stands for. He will be missed.

Linda Brown Faulkner '68

Bill Fuson was one of a triad of sociology faculty from whom I learned to analyze and observe my culture. I took one of the three required core major courses from Bill and am so grateful for his classical approach to sociology, which I continue to draw upon in my doctoral studies today. Old scholars never really die - they live on in the intellectual inquiry of their students. I am grateful to Bill for challenging me, for teaching me, for thinking critically and deeply with me and for sparking within me a love of the study of society.

Holly Dillon Inglis '78

When I came to Earlham in 1959, Bill Fuson was a highly respected faculty member and, if I recall correctly, was soon appointed Academic Assistant. Within a year or so I was playing volleyball with a group of faculty which included Landrum Bolling and Bill Fuson and either Bill or Landrum called a ball out and the other called it in. And for what seemed to be an eternity neither would accept the other's judgement. Where I came from you didn't argue with the President, at least not the way they did. I wanted to crawl into a hole.

But I began to learn some things about Quakers then. Quakers do not live by the ordinary rules of hierarchy. They also can hold their opinions very strongly. And they also will accept the fact that others hold strong opinions. And they can live with others holding diverging opinions. I, of course learned much more fully what Quakers were like over time, and I learned also that Quakers were not always perfect examples. But Bill Fuson never disappointed me. I always held him in the highest regard.

Jerry Bakker