Day: April 20, 2012

I was raised in the Minnesota Northwoods. I lived in a small town called Pequot Lakes. It was named after an Indian chief from a small tribe in eastern Connecticut. The most common  explanation for the town’s name comes from the Wikipedia and was found “… in a 1936 interview [with] Laurence Anderson, who moved to the town in the mid 1890s. He stated [per Wikipedia], “…a daughter of Waubanaquot, Chief of the White Earth Tribe, was named O-Pequot and lived north of the town on the north end of Sibley Lake. She graciously allowed her dugout home to be used as a school and a church for the early settlers of the town. When she died, she was buried in the town cemetery.” We never really knew where the town’s name came from. Interestingly enough, this same town would and could not [state law did not allow the selling of liquor to American Indians] let American Indians in the local bars to drink. Most of my Indian friends lived off the reservation in poverty or nothing more than tar paper shacks.

It never really occurred to us to discriminate or notice that my friends and classmates were different. I did not notice their poverty or nationality. Our school-house had all grades up to K-12 in one building. Our classroom held about 20 children. At least fifty percent of the children in the school, including the teachers, were American Indian. While my mother and father built their own home and a motel, it never occurred to me that American Indians did not have the same freedoms my family did. There were a lot of people who did not have money in this small resort town. I am certain that there was crime in the town. However, we never locked our doors when we left our home. Our neighbors didn’t either. My brother and mother and I would walk to the town to go to the movies every week or when the movie changed in the summer. It was about a five-mile walk. We were never afraid, when we walked to town and back in the dark, not of the animals or other people.

By the time I was twelve, my mother and father came to a parting of the ways. My mom and I moved to St. Cloud, Minnesota which had a population of 15,000 people. To me it was the “Big City.”  It was a ninety percent Catholic town; and after living in a town of less than 550 people it seemed huge and strange. There were Catholic churches about every ten blocks. In Pequot Lakes there was only a mission church and the sisters came once a year to stay at our neighbor ladies home, so they could drive to town and teach us heathens God’s word. I suppose I never really learned past the heathen part. It was a mortal sin to sit or attend a Lutheran service; but in Pequot Lakes I attended services with my aunts from my dad’s side almost every Sunday, when our church didn’t have services.

In St. Cloud I learned what it meant to be unacceptable. Since my mom was divorced, she was an outcast. Since I was somewhat of a heathen, so was I. My mom sent me to Catholic school and it became very clear by the time I was high school age, that not only was I an outcast, but I was treated by the popular boys like I was a walking disease. It wasn’t long before I quit my Catholic High School and enrolled in the non-Catholic school–St. Cloud Technical High. It wasn’t long before I found out I didn’t fit in there either. I soon began hanging out with other misfits. Finally, I had enough and quit school after my tenth grade year. I had gone from having many friends in Pequot Lakes, down to just a few really good ones. Unfortunately, these friends did think money mattered and they did see nationality or race. However, they had very little of the first and a whole lot of the second.

It wasn’t long before I found myself married and divorced with four children to support and only a high school education, obtained through the GED program. I did love anything related to criminal justice and read everything I could get my hands on. A decade went by before I could afford, with help of federal grants, to go to college at St. Cloud State University. It was here my life was to change forever. I had four children and had one on the way. I married a U.S. Marine just back from Vietnam and swore I would never live in poverty again. I was going to get a college education and work for the government.

I was inspired by a sociology professor at St. Cloud State and eventually landed in Salt Lake City, Utah. I enrolled in the University of Utah and stayed there until I received my Master’s of Science degree in Political Science. I studied everything I could get my hands on in Criminal Justice studies. I did an internship at the Salt Lake City Police Department, under a federally supported program in the Crime Analysis Unit. I entered statistics into the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report and helped set up a grid to determine where and what types of crimes where being committed in the city, in order to staff those areas with more police officers. I soon became familiar with international crime and international law and organizations. Before long, I was working on my doctorate at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, in its prestigious political science department.

Another divorce occurred and I found myself alone and homeless in Tacoma, Washington. Oddly enough I was still a misfit. With the lack of money and time, I had dropped out of my doctoral program and came to Washington to be with my mother during her declining years before her death. I found myself homeless a time or two. I was bound and determined to eventually get back to the university, finish my doctorate and teach. I no longer had any wish to work for the American government. Having tried my hand at working as a correctional officer for the state of Washington, I soon realized my degrees were not respected. The only thing that seemed to matter was I was poor and working at whatever job I could find.

When I found the eLearning program and met Norma Whitacre, she seemed convinced I would never get to teach in the area of Criminal Justice. I was, very,  determined to prove her wrong and find a way to get the tools I needed to teach the subject that interested me and burned to be shared. So far Bellevue College has given me the opportunity to create curriculum for a course on campus. Every quarter, I struggle to keep finding an open door and the funds to keep going. The federal government is still paying for my classes and I am moving forward with each passing school year. One person is responsible for these funds. She works for King County and Worksource in Renton. She is one of the most dedicated people I know.

I have come a long way from the days when you could leave your doors unlocked and that quiet sleepy resort town of Pequot Lakes, now population 1936. There have been key people all along the way that have guided me and helped me get my education and use it. In the end the people who have helped me are my instructors and professors, the Catholic clergy (key members) and my friends that have listened to me in my down times and helped pick me up. The federal government and its programs for those without funds has been key to my ability to afford college and my university studies. The newest addition to this list is my mentor Robin Jeffers and Charlene Freyberg, who has unfailingly offered to help me achieve my goals  (honorable mentioned to Michael Reese).  I will always be eternally grateful that people like this exist and I was lucky enough to find them!.