Dr. Ronald Schapp was an odd bird, which is almost an insult to the Dodo. Except the dodos are all long gone and wouldn’t really care about being compared to Ronald Schapp. Schapp was the instructor of the Advanced Audio Production course during my freshman year. I saw him only a few times that first semester during which time I was part of the news department. Oddly, I seemed to see him more often the following spring semester when I wasn't on staff and only in the building for communication classes.
I never had Schapp as an instructor; I was greatly pleased and only slightly disappointed about this. To begin, Schapp looked sort of like a cross between a mediocre Truman Capote impersonator and a wrinkled balloon. Even with this dumpy façade, he still gave off bad vibes and had a forbidding presence about himself when you saw him. He was, to put it bluntly, quite arrogant (the type who made eye contact only to stare you down). I believe he was originally from Michigan or Minnesota or somewhere else in the Midwest, and had been something of a major player at a television station there. Having grown tired of the day-to-day operations, he decided to "retire" to teaching. From this background he brought plenty of "real world" experience to the classroom setting, which I thought would be good for an instructor to have. But, as I recall from stories from Mike and James (see There where the air is free, we'll be what we want to be) and others, classes tended to be him talking of his past successes and belittling everyone else. If Schapp had any drawback, I suppose it was that he was perhaps too intelligent to be open-minded of the limitations of his students.
Whether or not Schapp knew it or not, this was to be his last school year on campus. I never heard a convincing answer as to why he departed: some said he was tired of lazy students while others said it was the other way around, he was a sloppy teacher who grew lazy himself and gave passing grades to anyone who bothered to show up. I have hazy memories of him sort of defying authority and letting the radio station staff do what they wanted that spring semester. Or, perhaps, this is what led to his dismissal – I don't know.
It would make sense in a way, seeing how the radio staff that assembled that fall semester came off as a bit more rebellious than before. Part of that cockiness may have stemmed from the fact that the two faculty members that had the most to do with the radio station – Dr. Propel, the faculty advisor, and Dr. Schapp, station manager and Advanced Audio instructor – both resigned at the end of the spring semester.
When students returned that fall, some of them – like the new Program Director, Frank Deluge – apparently felt they knew more than Propel and Schapp's replacements. Propel was replaced by Martin Manning, a young, charismatic guy fresh out of graduate school. Schapp was replaced by the legendary Julian LeMeck, coming to campus now for his second time. Deluge was replaced before the end of the semester, which we’ll get to later....
Anyway, I remember bringing up Schapp a few times during my junior and senior years and I usually got only strange looks in return. Was it something I said, or something he did? Why did I come across as the damnable one for bringing his name up? No one seemed to know (or remember) him and probably assumed I had spent too much time at the station.
Yeah, they probably were right.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Holier Than Thou
(Lloyd Cole)
Lloyd Cole
From the album Bad Vibes
1993
Holier than thou, yes its true
Im too good for you
Higher than heaven, taller than jesus
Charlie knows just what you need is
Were going down, down, underground
Were going down, down, underground
Trust me I know what is true
What is good for you
Here in your heaven, in your hell
Are you living, pray tell
Were going down, down, underground
Were going down, down, underground
Now you're leaving all your friends behind
All damnations to the family
Are you ready to be born again
Should you awake
Down, down, down
Down, down, underground
Holier than thou, yes its true
Im too good for you
Higher than heaven, taller than jesus
Charlie knows just what you need is
Were going down, down, underground
Were going down, down, underground
Were going down, down, underground
Were going down, down, underground
