Theme: Home Economics
Stacy Allison Oral History Interview
Life history interview conducted by Janice Dilg.
July 21, 2014
Stacy Allison (b. 1958) grew up on a farm near Woodburn, Oregon before attending OSU
as an undergraduate majoring in Nutrition. While at Oregon State, Allison discovered
a passion for mountain climbing that ultimately led to her dropping out of school
in favor of pursuing the summits of many of the world's highest peaks. In September
1988, Allison made history when she became the first U.S. woman to reach the summit
of Mount Everest. In addition to her noteworthy career as a mountaineer, Allison
has also developed successful businesses as a motivational speaker and a general contractor.
Her interview focuses on her early climbing years in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest,
her two expeditions to Mount Everest, the advancement of women in mountaineering from
the 1980s to present day, and her career outside of mountain climbing.
Rollie and Laverne Bilyeu Oral History Interview
Life history interview conducted by Mike Dicianna.
March 26, 2015
Rollie (b. 1933) and Laverne Bilyeu (b. 1932), both raised in rural northeast Oregon,
met as sophomores at Oregon State College and married during the summer before their
junior year. Majoring in Business Administration and Home Economics respectively,
the Bilyeus lived, studied and worked as a married couple for two years before graduating
with the class of 1955. In their interview, Rollie and Laverne reflect on OSC's campus
culture during the early 1950s, discuss their shared experience as married students,
and outline their varied occupational pursuits in the years that followed, including
Laverne's association with several county branches of the OSU Extension Service.
Dorothy Fenner Oral History Interview
Life history interview conducted by Janice Dilg.
March 22, 2014
Dorothy Fenner (b. 1917) attended Oregon State College as an undergraduate from 1935-1939
and as a master's student from 1939-1941, obtaining degrees from the college's Home
Economics program. During World War II, Fenner served her country as a code-breaker,
intercepting and interpreting Japanese signals from a base in northern California.
After the war, she and her husband John engaged the OSU and Corvallis communities
in numerous capacities, including work with the OSU Alumni Association, OSU Foundation
and Music Department. Fenner's interview focuses on her years as an OSC student, her
war service and her connections to the university in the decades that followed.
Aya Fujii Oral History Interview
Life history interview conducted by Mike Dicianna.
September 15, 2015
Aya Fujii was born in 1927 in Hillsboro, Oregon and grew up with six siblings on her
family's farm. In May 1942, she and her family were forcibly relocated from their
home as part of the war-era policy of Japanese American internment on the west coast.
Fujii ultimately spent nearly all of her high school years in Adrian, Oregon, where
her family participated in a field labor program for interned citizens that was administered
by the Eastern Oregon Farm Labor Bureau. In fall 1945, just after the conclusion
of World War II, Fujii enrolled at Oregon State College, where she majored in Home
Economics. She later spent more than thirty years working as a dietician at two Portland-area
hospitals. In her interview, Fujii shares her memories of her family background and
upbringing; her experience of being interned for over three years; her undergraduate
tenure at OSC; and her life and work following college.
Melinda Manore Oral History Interview
Life history interview conducted by Chris Petersen.
November 30, 2015
Melinda Manore (b. 1951) received her Ph.D. in Nutrition from Oregon State University
in 1984. In 2001, Manore returned to OSU, joining the faculty as chair of what was
then the Department of Nutrition and Food Service Management. A pioneering scholar
of the intersections between nutrition and exercise, Manore has published widely on
topics including rural obesity in children, nutrition and exercise for women, and
healthy eating for athletes. Her interview traces the arc of her academic career with
a particular focus on her achievements in research. Included as a secondary topic
are Manore's institutional memories of the transformation of the College of Home Economics
into what is now the College of Public Health and Human Sciences.
The OSU Extension Service Centennial Oral History Collection
Sixteen life history interviews conducted by Elizabeth Uhlig.
August 2007 - June 2009
In anticipation of its centennial in 2011, the Oregon State University Extension Service
interviewed several of its emeritus faculty in 2007, 2008, and 2009. These interviews
help to tell the story of Extension in Oregon over a fifty-year period following World
War II, and cover topics including agriculture, 4-H, home economics, energy, community
development, Sea Grant, communications, administration, and support. The interviewees
who are included in the collection that is presented here are: Roberta Anderson, Len
Calvert, Dean Frischknecht, John Hansen, Bob Jacobson, Duane Johnson, Alberta Johnston,
Harold Kerr, Glenn Klein, Linda Modrell, Owen Osborne, Jack Ross, Jane Schroeder,
Walt and Sally Schroeder, Greg Tillson, and Tom Zinn.
Clara Pratt Oral History Interview
Life history interview conducted by Janice Dilg.
August 4, 2015
Clara Pratt (b. 1948) worked as a faculty member at OSU for more than thirty years,
directing the university's Gerontology program from 1974 to 1993, and also serving
as Oregon State's final dean of Home Economics. It was in this latter capacity that
Pratt was closely involved with the dissolution of what was then known as the College
of Home Economics and Education, and the creation of the predecessor to today's College
of Public Health and Human Sciences. Pratt was likewise involved in the early conversations
surrounding the creation of a branch campus in Bend, and to this day works part-time
as an instructor at OSU-Cascades. Her interview touches upon her forty year association
with OSU and her key involvement in major changes within Gerontology, Home Economics,
Health and Human Sciences, and OSU-Cascades.
Jean Starker Roth Oral History Interviews
Four life history interviews conducted by Maia Fischler.
September - November 2007
Jean Starker Roth (1920-2015) was an influential alumna who supported a wide range
of initiatives on the OSU campus and in the Corvallis community. The daughter of
T.J. Starker - an OAC graduate and faculty member in Forestry, and a successful businessman
and civic leader - Starker Roth completed her degree in Home Economics in 1942. She
worked for seven years as a teacher and Extension staffer, and also supported the
war effort at Camp Adair and elsewhere. In 1948 she married Kermit Roth, and over
the decades that ensued the couple raised four children. After Kermit's death in 1979,
Jean assumed control of the family's business activities while also giving back generously
to the community and to her alma mater. Over the course of four interviews, Starker
Roth recalls her upbringing and schooling in Corvallis, her management of the Roth
family household, her involvement with a variety of business concerns, and her many
philanthropic activities.