T. Harry Williams Center for Oral History Collection

ABSTRACT

INTERVIEWEE NAME: David Schorr COLLECTION: 4700.1512

IDENTIFICATION: 1965 LSU graduate, ROTC, U.S. Air Force, IBM employee

INTERVIEWER: Dominica Ramirez

PROJECT: LSU Salutes

INTERVIEW DATES: November 9, 2001

FOCUS DATES: 1961-1965, 1965-2001

ABSTRACT:

Tape 3077, Side A

Born in New Orleans on August 4, 1944 to Alphonse, a foreman at a textile plant, and Ethel, a housewife; both parents left school after sixth or seventh grade; his three older brothers, Robert, Thomas, and Gerard; Robert was a Marine, now deceased; Thomas was in the Navy, now working for University of Pittsburgh; Gerard was in the Army, shot down as a helicopter pilot in Vietnam; Schorr was positively influenced by his father’s good advice; first college experience at LSU-New Orleans, (now University of New Orleans); dropped out of college because of disinterest in school and lack of proper study habits; started LSU in1961; fraternity activities with Sigma Pi; discussion of sorority and fraternity members and activities on campus; remembers Bob Hope visiting campus in 1961 and 1964; involvement in ROTC and Arnold Air Society; description of ROTC hierarchy and daily life for ROTC members; description of freshmen rituals/rites of passage like the Pajama Game; military training and discipline helped him improve academically; Arnold Air Society details; ROTC summer boot camp at Eglin Air Force Base, summer 1964; feels proud to have attended LSU; inexpensiveness of LSU and other colleges in the early to mid 60s; first military assignment as a radar controller at Truax Field in Madison, Wisconsin; working on SAGE [Semi-Automatic Ground Environment] Air Defense System; worked briefly as a radar controller; attended computer programming school at Keesler Air Force base in Mississippi; transfer to Luke Air Force base in Arizona in 1967; honorable discharge in 1969; military was an extension of his college education.

Tape 3077 Side B

Schorr never wanted to be a career military person and move all over the country; SAGE experience led him to work for IBM in Kansas City, Kansas, in Houston, and in Minneapolis; worked on the space shuttle in Houston and Cape Canaveral, Florida; worked for Lockheed Martin in 1981; worked for the FAA from 1982-1986; hired again by IBM in Houston and still working there at time of interview; first wife and daughter in Minnesota; second marriage; thinks mandatory ROTC participation should still be the policy at LSU.

TAPES: 1 TOTAL PLAYING TIME: 51 Minutes

# PAGES TRANSCRIPT: 36

OTHER MATERIALS: Informed Consent, LSU Salutes Biographical Information Form

RESTRICTIONS: None