.294 | to Professor Irwin T. Sanders, from Roger Whitaker, Professor Emeritus, George Washington University
A Life-Changing Conversation
Sometimes our lives change by design; we plan our future and follow a well-worn path to realize our intentions. As often, our lives change by happenstance, by quirky twists of opportunity. And for me, my life changed because Professor Irwin T. Sanders of Boston University just happened to be in his office on a Friday afternoon in 1972. Here’s my story:
After completing my Master’s Degree at B.U. in 1972 I decided not to continue with the doctoral program and that is when Professor Sanders changed my life. Dr. Sanders was a distinguished scholar of East European Affairs and the Chair of my department so, as a courtesy, I dropped by his office on a Friday afternoon to share my decision to suspend further gradate work and, instead, join Volunteers in Service to America. Thirty minutes later I walked out of Professor Sanders’ office, cancelled my appointment with VISTA recruiters and became Dr. Sanders’ assistant for a three-year research project on Eastern Europe. I knew nothing about Eastern Europe at the time. I continued my doctoral program coursework and was then awarded a 10-month grant to be the first American authorized to do field research for my dissertation in communist-led Bulgaria, the country where Professor Sanders carried out his Ph.D. research in the 1930s. He studied a village while teaching Latin at the American College of Sofia, near Bulgaria’s capital city of Sofia. I restudied that village 40 years later to assess continuity and change comparing village social structure during the pre-communist (1930s) and communist periods when I did my research. Dr. Sanders visited my wife and me when we were in Bulgaria and my two children, then three and five years old, called him Grampa. He was very pleased.
On my return to the States after nine months, I was hired as a faculty member at B.U. (with Dr. Sanders as my lead reference, of course) and since that time I’ve spent my professional life in higher education, as a professor and administrator at Boston University and George Washington University. I owe my professional life to Dr. Sanders. He and I collaborated on two books, co-authored articles and book chapters, and together wrote many presentations for international conferences. We shared hotel rooms while attending conferences and became the very best of friends. When Dr. Sanders was in his 90s, he invited me to lunch at the Cornell Club in New York because he wanted me to meet someone special. I assume the guest would be a well-known scholar or political figure associate with Balkan Studies. Instead, he proudly introduced me to his fiancé. What a gentleman.
Our relationship came full circle with the fall of communism in Eastern Europe in 1989. The American College of Sofia where Professor Sanders had taught for six years was authorized to re-open after having been closed by Bulgaria’s communist government for 50 years. I was selected to be the founding president of the re-opened college and I served for two years while on leave from B.U. My first act as was to name the first classroom building on the campus as Sanders Hall.
My life changed because Professor Sanders just happened to be in his office on a Friday afternoon in 1972. I will be forever grateful for my dear friend and mentor: Irwin T. Sanders and for a half-hour conversation when he changed my life.