Quayle recalls how 'it all began at DePauw'

Friday, April 3, 2015

In a career that has seen him visit Greencastle and 47 foreign countries ... go from the Deke House to the White House ... dine at Marvin's and the Old Ebbitt Grill ... rub elbows with Vernon Jordan and Michael Jordan ... all while serving as the 44th vice president of the United States along with stints in the House and Senate along the way, Dan Quayle knows his roots are covered in Hoosier soil.

And as a 1969 DePauw University graduate, Quayle can rightly say, "It all began at DePauw."

Former Vice President Dan Quayle reminisces about his days as a DePauw University WGRE radio newscaster for current new director Sarah Burtshaw (left), a Centerville, Ohio, junior, and Erin Mann, assistant news director and a Rocky River, Ohio, sophomore. Quayle recalled the old radio station on the second floor of the Union Building and how he did the six o'clock news "with a guy named Jim Ibbotson," another 1969 DPU grad and longtime member of the music group the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. "We viewed ourselves as Huntley-Brinkley types," Quayle said in reference to the longtime NBC news anchors Chet Huntley and David Brinkley.

Actually he did so three times earlier this week. First during a Tuesday afternoon press conference, then during a short visit to WGRE radio and finally while appearing for the university's 100th Ubben Lecture Series presentation that night.

"You can talk about where you're born, where you went to high school, but it's where you went to college and this is going to stick with you the rest of your life," Quayle said, "and you're gonna be amazed at what kind of rewards you're gonna have from having gone to this great university."

As a political science major, Quayle cut his teeth on world affairs while on campus, recalling discussions at the old fraternity house on East Anderson Street that lasted long into the night.

"I was here during the Vietnam War," he said during a press conference in Watson Forum. "I can remember many all-night discussions about who might be the best at ending the war (Republican Richard Nixon or Democrat Hubert Humphrey). That was the issue that consumed us. I probably honed my debate skills late those evenings."

Such thinking is all part of the liberal arts education, he reasoned.

"It exposes you to life," the 68-year-old Quayle, whose age belies his youthful appearance, said.

"It's what you learn in the classroom, but it's also what you learn outside the classroom. It's a learning experience 24/7," said Quayle who captained the golf team and was a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity which is now an apartment house.

"I don't know what happened to the Deke House, but it couldn't have been good," its most famous alum laughed. "I asked President (Brian) Casey, 'What happened to my fraternity?'"

Under questioning by DePauw prof. Jeff McCall, Quayle recalled being the "pledge master" in the days when hazing was a common occurrence.

"I'm surprised that didn't come out in the campaign," he laughed.

"The press, they think they know everything," he smiled, wagging a finger as if to say no. "They don't know the half of it."

As a third-generation DePauw student, Quayle noted, "Every time you come back you just go back down memory lane. You think about the good times and all the people that you met -- it's so special ... I think the longer you're away from it, the more you yearn for it."

Quayle, who took time Thursday to play nine holes of golf at Windy Hill Country Club in Greencastle, the DPU Tigers' home course, called late golf coach Ted Katula "an inspiration."

"'Katman,'" he said, noting that back then golf coaches routinely played the course as their team did, "took great pleasure in us asking him what he shot."

Quayle also told of another inspiration, Professor Lawrence, who wore jeans and his hair long before it became the norm. Lawrence suggested a theory to his class that FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover was dead, asking students if they had seen him or heard anything about him lately.

They more they thought about it, the students started to buy into the notion, Quayle said.

"We didn't have Google to do the research back then," he reminded, but after a few days of resourceful use of the library, the class learned Hoover (who died a few years later in 1972) was very much alive, getting a valuable lesson in human nature in the process.

Expressing the opinion that Congress needs more people with business backgrounds than law degrees, Quayle said he may have changed his major if he were starting college again.

"I think if I had to do it all over again, I would have majored in accounting," he said to a few muffled chuckles from the audience. "When I was in office, 60 percent of us in Congress were lawyers, that's not necessarily a good thing."

Quayle, an Indianapolis native, was elected to two terms in the U.S. House of Representatives and two in the U.S. Senate before George H. W. Bush (the 41st president or "41" as Quayle calls him) picked him for his running mate in 1988.

How that all came about produced some of the lighter moments of his conversation with Prof. McCall.

Just prior to the 1988 Republican Convention in New Orleans, Bush called Quayle's Senate office three times before reaching him to ask if he could consider Quayle as a running mate.

"Absolutely," the senator said, asking for 24 hours to talk it over with wife Marilyn and their three children, ages 12, 10 and 8.

When he told his kids he was being considered for the GOP ticket, Quayle recalled the youngest saying only, "Really?"

The middle child was more blunt. "He's not gonna pick you ... you're not even a famous senator," he said, while Quayle's daughter said, "You know he's going to pick Bob Dole."

"So I was out," Quayle commented as the Kresge Auditorium audience howled.

Of course, the young Hoosier senator (41 at the time) ended up the choice, getting the call about two hours before the announcement was made.

Bush swore him to secrecy and told him to be at the Spanish Plaza in New Orleans where, unbeknownst to Quayle, about 30,000 people had assembled in front of the stage to witness the unveiling of Bush's choice for vice president.

Trying to make his way through that crowd to reach the stage to be introduced, Quayle encountered a staunch Republican with a sharp elbow. As Quayle tried to sneak past him, the delegate, thinking the future vice president was cutting in line, gave him a shot to the solar plexus.

"He said, 'I've been waiting here two hours to see who George Bush is going to name his vice president.'"

As vice president 1989-93, Quayle traveled to 47 countries over four years, headed the Council on Competitiveness and was the first chairman of the National Space Council.

"But what I did most for '41' (Bush) was serve as his eyes and ears on Capitol Hill because I was in both the House and the Senate. He was in the House, but not the Senate."

Quayle said the role of vice president is far from the political stepping stone people believe it is. In fact, when Bush was elected president in 1988, he was the first elected vice president to be elected president since Martin Van Buren in 1836, Quayle noted.

"The role of the vice president is rather interesting and sometimes awkward," Quayle said, "because you're there to assist the president but any time you do something -- whether it's foreign travel, or dealing on Capitol Hill, or you're dealing with tax matters, environmental matters or budget matters -- you're always doing somebody else's job.

"You're always stepping on someone's toes. And I was fortunate to have George Bush be vice president for eight years (before me) because he knew the challenges of being a vice president. You're really almost like a surrogate chief of staff."

The vice president, as Quayle well knows, can be the media whipping boy at times.

The media, he said, always feel a need to pick either the president or the vice president.

"And it's really much better for the president if they're picking on the vice president," he laughed.

"And so for three-and-a-half years they sort of picked on me. But the last six months they didn't. They turned their fire to '41.'"

Quayle launched a brief bid for the presidency in 1999, before George W. Bush, entered the race with the obvious endorsement of his father.

After the ill-fated presidential bid, wife Marilyn suggested the former vice president "get a real job" for a change.

"I said, 'You know, Marilyn, that's probably a good idea.'"

Quayle now resides in Paradise Valley, Ariz., and serves as chairman of Cerberus Global Investments LLC, one of the world's leading private investment firms.

"At times I look back and think maybe I should have made another run (at president)," he told reporters at the press conference. "You could make the argument, and a lot of people did, that I should have run for (Indiana) governor in 1996 after we were defeated in 1992.

"So every once in a while, I think, 'What if ...'"

Respond to this story

Posting a comment requires free registration: