Rock Voices: The Oral History Project of Slippery Rock University
[Ettore] Steve Gagliardo Interview
July 3, 2008
Bailey Library, Slippery Rock University, Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania
Interviewed by Brady Crytzer
Transcribed by Lindsay Whalen
Proofread and edited by Judy Silva and Mark O‟Connor
BC: Today is Thursday, July 3 [2008]; the time is 8:50, and I‟m joined by Mr. Steve Gagliardo.
SG: My name is Steve Gagliardo; I‟ve been affiliated with Slippery Rock off and on for probably
the last thirty-five years.
BC: Okay, can you talk about where you went to school and when you first arrived at Slippery
Rock?
SG: I transferred to Slippery Rock in 1967 as a nontraditional student, transferred from
Youngstown [State] University. And basically the reason I transferred is Youngstown became a
state school and the tuition increased, and I thought Slippery Rock would be a bargain and would
be a just as equal or better education. I graduated in 1969 with a B.S. in Education. The school
has changed greatly since then.
BC: [Laughs] what other positions did you work at Slippery Rock over the thirty-five years of
your affiliation?
SG: Like I said, I graduated in 1969 and I returned to Slippery Rock in 1972 as the assistant
director of housing. And later on that year the director left so I was appointed the director of
housing and I served [in] that capacity for twenty-nine years. I also served as the [inaudible], I
didn‟t have the seniority--I became the director of veterans‟ affairs at the time. Slippery Rock
had a lot of veterans from the Vietnam War and actually students, the male students were a little
afraid of me because I had the ability if they did something wrong I could pull their, I can‟t think
of the word now . . . deferment, I could pull their deferment. So I worked greatly with the
campus disciplinary office and the men behaved; they had a lot more incentive to behave than
they do now.
BC: What was the change like from assistant director to the director? It seems you did that rather
quickly; were you nervous at all?
SG: Yes, to tell you the truth, I was nervous because at the time the director left for California;
he wanted to go to California. And I sat in his chair and the first thing I did was develop a
budget, having a local checking account to buy [inaudible] you get hit with the $2.5 million
dollar budget, and that was the easy part, [to] develop [it]. Going before Dr. [Champ] Storch-before student affairs--defending it. Dr. Storch . . . then took me to Dr. Thompson who was the
director of business affairs at the time and we had to defend it there. And it was like trying to

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steal candy from a baby or a bone from a Rottweiler „cause the business director held everything
close to his chest.
BC: Any memories of the transition period from college to university?
SG: Transitions: I was the president of the APSCUF at the time and we had a great celebration
down at the entrance. Dr. [Herb] Reinhardt was president and we had a big celebration
transferring from state college to a university and we spoke and it was like a festive affair. It was
prestige: we were getting prestige although at that time it was change of the name but it gave us
status. I think it led to the recruitments of more students because now you were a university and
it was also an improvement for [Bailey] Library because at that time, something about . . . you
had to have so many books or so many archives or periodicals and all that to become a
university. And I think that, I have a poor memory, but the library people had a lot of clout; they
were very politically active too. But it led to prestige, we were no longer a college, people would
say, “Oh, you work at Slippery Rock College.” “No, I work at Slippery Rock University.”
BC: Not only administration, but the general consensus was that everyone was excited about that
change.
SG: Everybody at that time; like I said it was a celebration. The student body came out and there
were refreshments and [pause] all the faculty liked it because it gave you prestige. And when you
were looking for another job if you wanted to leave Slippery Rock [inaudible] you were leaving
from a university. It could be a good title, be a good status at the time too.
BC: Changes early on in your career to the end?
SG: When I first became a part of Slippery Rock I was a student affairs and resident hall
assistant. We had no visitation during the week and on Saturday and Sunday from one to three
o‟clock they had visitation, but they had a rule then that you had to have both feet on the
floor. And I used to laugh and I told the president, “Why was this?” And he said, “I don‟t want
anyone getting pregnant.” It was Dr. [Albert] Watrel. And I said if they get pregnant off campus,
I said, their parents are gonna be like, “They got pregnant at Slippery Rock.” They aren‟t going
to care. But that was his big thing and it was like that about five years before we had twenty-four
hour visitation on the weekends only. During the week a student was here to work and study;
they were not here to socialize, so it was like that.
We had no co-ed halls. We had . . . Dr. Watrel was here when we had our first co-ed hall. We
had one hall [that] went co-ed. Myself and . . . Jimmy Jones was the student on trustees, and Don
Herschling, state Senator Herschling, was the chairman, and we snuck it through over the
president‟s protest and he told me, “You are gonna live in the residence hall just for that.” Which
I did.
It was no major thing at that time: we did it by wings, and later on we added floors, we did it by
floors. When Patterson Hall went co-ed, unbeknownst to me, the coordinators in charge did it by
rooms and it was probably two months into the semester before anybody realized, even the
administration, even myself. But there were no problems.
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BC: Which hall went co-ed first? Was it Patterson?
SG: No it wasn‟t Patterson. It was . . . I don‟t remember, I think it was Bard Hall at the time
because we had wings. God forbid it, the president at that time, after he left it became easier
because when Dr. Reinhardt came in--he came from Bloomington, Indiana where they had co-ed
residence halls.
BC: Was it traditional to keep North Hall all female?
SG: Well you have to go back through the history of North Hall: Mrs. [Lillian] Yartz was the
housemother--last housemother in Slippery Rock. And she ran North Hall like a German field
general, and she was of German descent; [I] used to agitate her on that, kid her on that, but she
ran that . . . those were her girls, that was her hall. Her worst damage one year was twenty-five
dollars and she found out who did it and made them pay. [Laughter] But she ran that for years
and it was traditionally, from before, way back I guess, when North Hall was opened [it] was
female, kept female. And South Hall was the male hall and we just perpetuated [that].
I did my sabbatical right before I retired: I made a recommendation North Hall be given up. They
wanted to remodel the way it is remodeled now. I said why not just take it away and move it all
into administration and build more apartments? But as I said I was retiring; I retired a year after
and it went in one ear and out the other.
BC: Looking at the changes on campus now, are you pleased with that?
SG: I‟m please with it. We were . . . it took us about twenty years to get apartments here. Dr.
[Alfred] Matthews was here and he started it and he changed his mind when he found out the
cost but when the--oh I can‟t think, Sharon . . . oh she‟ll kill me--the VP [of Student Affairs], his
replacement. The VP came in and she was in favor of it. Sharon Johnson, Dr. Sharon Johnson.
Took us two years, but we were able to get them to build the Rock Apartments and I was very
proud of that accomplishment because [pause] we finally made the transition from archaic
residence halls to join the state of the modern world. And I thought that was very nice and the
kids were more than welcoming. They more than wanted it. It was very desirable.
And at that time we kept the cost--I think it was about a hundred dollars more than living in the
residence hall--we kept the cost down. Now, these new buildings are nice, I would not favor the
type of suites: I would have [gone] for more apartments. I made the recommendation for more
apartments as part of my report for my sabbatical, but the cost now is just, I‟m a little shocked at
the costs when I found what it costs to live in the suites. It costs too much and it‟s making more
money for the Foundation but I don‟t think the students should be paying. That‟s just my
opinion.
BC: I don‟t know how much involvement you had with the off-campus apartments, but it seems
like in the late „eighties, early „nineties there was a lot of unrest, particularly across the street
[Keister Road]. Was that a concern in your area or was that kind of hands-off, off campus?

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SG: Yes, it was hands off. It was also a concern 'cause [as] the director of residence life I used to
get the calls, and I remember one night I got a call from Dr. [Robert] Aebersold at the time. He
said they were getting ready to go down and storm--the state police were storming Keister. They
had a block party. And he said go down and see what you can do; so I came up and I started
telling students, “Look, the police are massing up at the police station, they‟re gonna come down
here, if you‟re under twenty-one and you‟re drinking get lost.” And it‟s the first time I realized
they started calling me “Pops” down there.
Some of the people listened, some didn‟t. They came in right here and they surrounded the place
and they started: “If you‟re not twenty-one get in your cars or get out of here.” They made about
thirteen arrests. At that time there was a campus police officer that was down there, he was
partying with the students. He said, “This shouldn‟t have happened.” So the state police told me,
“When you go back up to Old Main tell the president („cause he knew the president was up
there), “that this police officer down here is causing us some problems.” I went up and told the
president; [the] police officer called to talk to the chief to raise heck, chief said, “Well wait a
minute he‟s right here,” [and] he gives the phone to the president. Such and such the president,
he clearly told the president “I resign.” “Put it in writing.” So he put it in writing, [and the]
president said, “Come here and put it in writing.” [He] had the president accept it. Next day he
circled up and asked for his job back; the president said “No.” That was it.
They were partying at Keister. That was the only major housing at that time. That was before
Campus Heights, before [inaudible] and that time there were few[er] police officers on duty in
Butler County at night. And I remember talking to one police officer, I can‟t remember his name,
I wouldn‟t say it even if I could. But he said they were having a block party; they called in. He
said I have three more calls, one‟s at Edmonton, one‟s at such and such; he said “I‟ll be there.”
He said, “What am I gonna do, surround it?” One police officer.
They were worried about the prices at Keister and the campus police at that time were not
allowed to go down there. And they had no police officers in the borough; [in] fact I think right
now we‟re sitting in the borough--not the borough, I think we‟re in [the] township right
now. They were not allowed to go down there, so we would get calls. As director of housing, I
would get calls. “Your students, your students are wild and partying out there, and urinating out
in public.” Yeah there was concern; there was nothing we could do. [The] borough was okay,
township was . . . students lived there because [inaudible].
BC: What buildings did you work in?
SG: I started out in Old Main and then I went to--I was lucky, I transferred to [inaudible] Hall
where the current housing office is, and we were there, turned out to be a TV station down there.
I wanted to go down there but Dr. Johnson didn‟t want to hear it, he said no way. But when I talk
about buildings, I came on campus, 1972, that‟s when we opened Founders. And now Founders
is gone; and it was ironic, here's a building thirty years old and they ripped it down, they should
have ripped other buildings down.
BC: First impressions when you came to the university compared to later on?

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SG: When I first came here, it was, we were like strictly adhering to the rules. Housing cost at
that time $211; food services were $211 a semester. I think tuition was something like $275, and
this was 1972 so you can see what inflation has done. But it was still something not totally . . .
they‟re eager to learn and we‟re here acting sort of as their parents and they‟re here for
education, [the] first thing and socialization is . . . that was something that did happen.
We operated the residence halls with myself as director, one graduate assistant and all seniors
acting as residence coordinators, and we ran it. When Dr. [inaudible] came on first thing we went
out and hired professionals. The bottom line is we spent a lot more money, we did improve, but
not that much. We didn‟t get the bang for the dollar that we should have. It started loosening up
in „72 and ‟73; we started recruiting more minority students, and students at the time [were] a
little leery of all these blacks coming here, you know, this was a white town. And the black
couldn‟t get a haircut [in town]. And the residence hall students weren‟t used to it but they made
the adjustment. And things started loosening up and joined the twentieth century.
BC: Campus activities you were involved in?
SG: Campus activities . . . I was on the Co-op Board [Cooperative Activities Advisory Board]. I
remember when Co-op and the University Union [were] up there where the Art Department is:
part of the Art Department was the Co-op office, and the cafeteria, and the Student Union. And it
was on two levels. Since then we‟ve seen the building expanded to the current Union, which I
understand they‟re replacing.
I was on the judicial board; I was on the [pause] not the telecommunication but when we went
from the old rotary telephones to . . . we bought our switch I was on that board.
And certainly a number of sports. Loved them. I was on the curriculum committee, union seat on
the curriculum committee. And safety committee, I was on the safety committee. One year I was
on the promotion committee for APSCUF, I was a member of the promotion committee and I
missed a meeting and I was elected president and that was my punishment for missing the
meeting.
Faculty promotion meeting was one of the hardest committees. You had to judge, you‟d get
seventy-five or eighty applications, and you had to rate them from one to say, thirty-five and then
after that you had to defend and fight with the president over who was going to get promoted. If
they promoted ten to fifteen faculty members a year and that was a large number. And people
would sell themselves to put together a promotion package. You could come before the
promotion committee and sell yourself and then we had to go sell you to the administration.
BC: Can you remember the presidents you were here for and anything about them?
SG: I think, if I remember, I was a student at the time . . . it was funny, there was a president his
name was [Robert] Carter. And he was fired and would not move out of the residence, the
president‟s residence. At that time I think Dr. Lowry was acting [president]; I think he was
acting, I‟m not sure. Whoever the acting president was shut the electricity off to force the
president out.
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And when I was hired, Dr. Watrel was president; I think one of the better presidents. He was
here for about four years. There was a power struggle between [him] and Dr. [James] Roberts,
who was the vice president of Academic Affairs. And one day the state police came rolling up,
walked up to the third floor of Old Main. Told the president, “You have to leave; I have orders
from the Secretary of Education: you are no longer president. You have to leave your office.” He
could not take any personal effects when he left his office. They locked the office, and the third
floor had . . . Carter was there for a week I think. You‟d go to the third floor and the state police
would look at you. We had to go [to] other offices and you just walked real quickly past the state
police.
And he moved out of the residence and I the president went from Dr. Roberts, who was the
acting president for a year. They sent a president up from, transferred from Mansfield [check
this] and he was here for two years, then Dr. Reinhardt came in. And he was strictly . . . he loved
to show himself on campus; he was like a cheerleader for the campus. He was very active and he
made Student Affairs, we had to come to meetings, he made the assistants. Dr. Aebersold was
the VP for Academic Affairs and when Dr. Reinhardt left Dr. Aebersold was acting president
and then he became president. And he was not the first choice because there was a candidate
from Florida who was the union‟s first choice, but the chancellor hired Dr. Aebersold and he did
a good job. He was here about ten to twelve years and we got the current president now. Oh and
there was a Dr. Smith then, the second Dr. Smith is in charge.
BC: Movers and shakers?
SG: She‟s still here today: Wilma Cavill; she‟s Slippery Rock. She was here when I came; she
came to my retirement party. They just honored her for what, her fiftieth year here. She was a
firecracker. She was active in bringing the union [to] campus, she was very active in union
affairs, she was VP of the state APSCUF.
Dr. Macoskey was here, he was [APSCUF] president here, and I succeeded Dr. Macoskey as
president of APSCUF; I was here for four years. Dr. Taylor took over after me, and then, I can‟t
think of her name and she was a great friend of mine [Kate Brennan], in the music department;
she became president.
At that time the female faculty members were starting to assert themselves. They were very
active in the union. There‟s a couple, if you showed me their picture, they were dear friends, and
I can‟t remember names (I hope it‟s not Alzheimer‟s) but they were movers and shakers. They
attended meetings; they were very active; when you needed support they turned out. They were
very student-oriented; they were very well liked by the students. There were many of us: Dr.
[Donald] Voss, Dr. [Irv] Kuhr. Numerous people but you can‟t remember them all. But faculty,
and Dr. Watrel, they still do this, but faculty were more involved in campus affairs, more
involved in making decisions. The original movers and shakers.
BC: You said your first year here you had a lot on your plate. Was there anyone who kind of
helped you through that or that you looked up to?

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SG: Dr. Champ Storch and Dr. Gellner(?) he was VP for Student Affairs; Tim Galloway(?) was
the assistant VP. They were very supportive, if you had a problem you could go into their
office. And if you disagreed with them, you could tell them, “I disagree.” You could do it with
Dr. Watrel [saying], “Bullshit, we‟re not gonna do it cause it‟s not right.” And he would discuss
it, argue with you, but you could do that. Dr. Reinhardt, if you said you weren‟t going to do
something there was hell to pay. On that aspect you did not challenge, he was the president, I
ain't the president.
Dr. Watrel would support you. I remember one time he said, “I want you to hire some football
players as guards.” And I hired them and I fired them and he hired them back and I fired
them. After about the seventh time he said, “Alright if you want to get rid of them, get rid of
them.” They would sit at the desks, they were jocks or athletes, but all the schools did that.
That‟s one of the reasons he got in trouble because he hired them. He said, you know, you put
them in residence halls and they would sit there. One thing was good though, if you have a 295
pound football player sitting at the desk no one would give them an argument. But those were
some of the things that happened back then.
We had the . . . they called it the Allegheny Club, the press box, that was Dr. Watrel‟s
downfall. He did not steal anything, but he ordered material, he said he ordered some [inaudible],
he built it with wood; he had built a press box. He had two favorite things, he wanted Slippery
Rock to scrimmage Notre Dame, and he wanted to have 7500 students by 1975. Those were his
two main ambitions. He got in trouble over that. But those were some of people that would
support you. You had support from the president, you had support from the VP; you even had
support from Dr. Thompson but he was hard to get money out of.
BC: This is a particularly pertinent question for you. Can you remember any cases where
something happened that was significant, and it could have gotten out of hand, that you had to
deal with the student body, keeping everything under control?
SG: Back when the minority students first came to campus, we had a case where a young lady
said somebody stole her [inaudible]--minority student. Said she later found it in a toilet, said
“Black is beautiful, I just gave birth,” and six minority students emptied out at that time, it was
Dodds Hall, 300 students. And we had guards, police posted there; [the] riot staff turned out.
[Inaudible] was the director of minority student affairs at that time. He reported to Dr. Storch, he
and I and Dr. Storch went down, we had to go in and patrol the building to make sure it didn‟t
turn into a full blown riot. That was one of the major crises.
Then we had a crisis, we had a homicide/suicide, we had a young couple, she was living off
campus at the time. This student came up, ex-student came up, talked to her, he was a minority,
he talked [to] her all night and said, “Are you gonna drop out of school and come home?” And
he wanted her to leave right then and there and she said no. He fired one shot through the door
and then he fired a shot and killed her and he killed himself, shot himself. They said, in the chest,
he was dead by the time he hit the ground. At that time, we had counselors, it happened on the
hill district they called it, in Summit I believe. State police came up and it was quite a shock.

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We had two other things, three other things happen. One event, three students, they went to bed
healthy and the next morning they were found dead in North Hall, Bard Hall, and I think one in
Dodds. The police came in and held investigations. They were normal deaths but something like
that . . . that was all in one semester. And it had all the students worried: like was there a curse on
the campus.
So the students came in, and we had a residence coordinator he told his friends that he was going
to church in the morning. He went to bed Saturday night and they came Sunday morning,
knocked on the door and he didn‟t answer. So they came back Sunday night, they knocked on the
door, still didn‟t answer. They saw water coming from under the door so they called campus
police and they found him in the shower, he was dead. There [were] all kinds of rumors and
stuff, but it was a natural death, but he was in the shower. Hot water was on him for about
twenty-four hours; that water actually cooked the skin on his back so it was a shock. So that
residence hall . . . not much you can do but have counselors to talk and let it work itself out. But
those were some of the crises we faced then.
BC: Do you remember any structures being built that you thought, “That‟s going to be a really
nice building,” or you didn‟t like the building so much?
SG: Founders, the way Founders was built we didn‟t like, but when you got [a] building
approved back then you took what you could get because the state would not come up with
money, and you had to go to the state and beg. Founders: we didn‟t like the way it was set up
because it was built like in a cross. It was supposed to be run by . . . there was an apartment on
each floor: it was supposed to be run by upper class students--professional students--and we
couldn‟t get the money. So that building we didn‟t like.
The other building, the music building [Swope Music Building]: it was supposed to be the fine
arts building, but because of money they could only build one section. Later on we formed a
bond issue for the Rock Apartments here and a series of town halls. We had four million in cash
and it cost eight million dollars to build that, so we had four million in building reserves and we
had to borrow four million, paying back seven and a half million because it was a bond issue,
that hurt us. We could have bought at that time, we could have bought [inaudible], but the
president didn‟t want to do it because it would have come off the tax rolls.
BC: What if anything do you miss about being at SRU?
SG: I miss . . . you do miss working with students, although students at times . . . believe it or not
I had a full head of hair when I came here, when I left it was . . . [laughs]. Students could drive
you crazy. But working with students . . . it seems the ones that you have problems with--me as a
faculty member had problems with--are the ones I remember. And I see them today and we‟re
like long lost friends. The good students you never interacted with, that‟s what you miss. The
good students, they came, they did their job, they made the honor roll; they came out and became
a success. And you didn‟t get to know them. I miss that.
And I miss the faculty. But I do not miss the meetings. We [pause] called this the M and M
institution: meetings and memos [laughter]: you went to meetings and you wrote memos. As any
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Gagliardo, Steve 9
other administrators, we wrote memos because of “CYA,” you know what that stands for: memo
to cover your behind. But that‟s what you miss, you do miss the camaraderie. In fact, the exAPSCUF presidents, we get together once a month; we get together and we go out to lunch. We
still keep in touch that way and through emails; we keep in contact.
BC: Anything else you want future or current Rock [community] members to know, and how
would you like to be remembered?
SG: I would like to be remembered as a good faculty member. As [a] president of APSCUF who
worked for the benefit of the union, for faculty members. I was on the APSCUF contract
negotiations committee. And we obtained great benefits and great raises at that time. Now
money‟s tight, the state will only come across--this last contract showed . . . . At that time we got
the raises, we never had to pay [a] co-pay for health insurance and we kept the part time faculty
members down to a minimum.
Also I‟d like to be remembered as the person who helped break the old residence hall regime and
built the apartments. If I could conclude, we had a member . . . from Yugoslavia; at that time it
was still Yugoslavia. The minister of education from Yugoslavia came here to visit Slippery
Rock and we took him through the residence halls. He looked and he says, “Who designed these
residence halls?” Well the designs, we tried to sell him, and he says, “We quit building these in
Soviet Union in 1940s.” He said, “At least in our residence halls we had rooms like this, but we
had a bathroom and a room.” He said “I don‟t understand how the people, how students could
accept this.” [Laughter] That‟s coming from the minister of education in Yugoslavia, and that
was in 1980!
So when you talk about residence halls we would go to campus meetings, [inaudible] the
association of university and college housing officers. When you go there, you said we were
strictly residence halls. You never told them we had double rooms with gang showers. You
wouldn‟t say that because they all had, most of them had apartment complexes or residence halls
that . . . two rooms had a bath. But that was the mentality back in Harrisburg.
The only other thing, when they built, I guess it was the Rec Center [Aebersold Recreation
Center]. I was on the committee when we pushed to have an Olympic size swimming pool in
there, and they did not do that. One of the reasons they didn‟t do that, because they said the
university would come in. So now you cannot hold swimming meets there because that does not
meet regulations. So if you held a swimming meet and someone broke a record it would not
count. We could not convince Dr. Johnson to have a swimming pool there.
BC: Any other comments?
SG: I still have pride in Slippery Rock. It‟s a great place to work; it‟s a great institution. I defend
Slippery Rock; I think it‟s as good as any institution. It‟s what a student puts in here. I had a
chance to talk to somebody on a scholarship committee and [they] said “Westminster‟s a better
school.” And I said, “Why?” and they said, “Well it costs $40,000.” But Westminster‟s not
paying its professors that much. We have professors making $100,000 and [at] Westminster
they‟re making $70,000. You as a faculty member, or you as a person, where would you rather
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Gagliardo, Steve 10
work in a place that pays you $100,000 or a place that pays you $70[000]? He said, “Well
$100,000,” and I said, “Well we got the pick of better faculty.” And we also have smaller
classes. I did my doctorate work at the University of Pittsburgh where we had a class of 275
people taught by a graduate assistant. Slippery Rock, [a] large class is thirty-five. We have a
little larger now; back then, when I was president of APSCUF a large class was twenty-seven,
taught by faculty members not by graduate students. So I mean, you come to get a quality
education at a good price.
BC: Absolutely, okay; well I‟d like to thank you; this was wonderful.
SG: I hope it added to the history of the school.
BC: Yes, absolutely.

Rock Voices: The Oral History Project of Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania