Carl Arthur Pierce – 50th Reunion Essay

Carl Arthur Pierce

2013 Kemper Lane

Knoxville, Tennessee 37920

cpierce5@utk.edu

865-441-8865

Spouse(s): Margaret (Peggy) Sawin Pierce (1970)

Child(ren): Emily Suzanne Pierce (1975); Kathryn Elizabeth Pierce Ramchand (1979)

Grandchild(ren): Isoiza Ryan Emah (2004); Lily Margaret Ramchand (2007); Anayimi Corinne Emah (2009)

Education: Madison (NJ) High School 1965; Yale College BA Magna Cum Laude 1969; Yale Law School 1972

Career: Professor of Law – University of Tennessee College of Law 1972-2014; Director – Howard H. Baker Jr. Center for Public Policy, University of Tennessee 2009-2014; Professor & Director Emeritus since 2014

Avocations: No longer running but regularly working out and elliptical training at gym; landscaping and yard maintenance; spending time with wife Peggy, our daughters and grandkids, and our golden retriever Willow; scanning and organizing family photos; research re career of Senator Howard H. Baker Jr.

College: Saybrook

My fondest memories of Yale College involve visits from my fiancée Peggy—now my wife, and for 47 years. We married in 1970 and, after my graduation from Yale Law School in 1972, moved to Knoxville, Tennessee, where I started teaching law and Peggy started teaching nursing. We welcomed daughters Emily and Katie into our family during the 1970s, then watched them grow, leave home for college, get good jobs, marry, and provide us with three wonderful grandchildren. After 40-plus years of teaching, we are both happily retired. Yale taught me nothing about how to manage a two-career, two-child, and one- or two-dog family. But so far so good!

Track and cross-country played a major role in my life at Yale, happily running fourth behind cross-country teammates Steve Bittner, Frank Shorter, and Bob Yahn and running on relay teams in Coxe Cage. Many miles and years later, I have had the pleasure of running with the “Old Blue,” a team of similarly aged Yalies (including Shorter, Bittner, and Larry Kreider from the Class of 1969) who gather each year in Oregon to run in the 195-mile Hood to Coast Relay. Boola Boola—the Yale experience lives on!

I also had the privilege of holding down a variety of jobs while at Yale and during the summers at home. I was fortunate to be a master’s aide in Saybrook College, but I also worked as both a busboy and kitchen worker in Davenport College. From my interaction with students I was serving as a busboy, I learned the importance of being friendly and appreciative rather than demanding, rude, or indifferent. I learned even more working side by side with the good folks in the kitchen who made it possible for Yalies to be so graciously and well fed. I also fondly remember working with the municipal road crew in my hometown during the summers and being taught by men who had not attended college but who knew how to do things I did not know how to do and were patient teachers. Having the opportunity to learn about working with people from people other than my Yale classmates and teachers added a special dimension to my Yale experience.

Academically, what I remember most is the opportunity in my senior year to work on a research paper about President Grover Cleveland’s efforts to fill a vacancy on the US Supreme Court in 1893. To this day I am convinced that this project was the key to my admission to law school. It also allowed me to discover how much I liked history, which in turn led me to add legal history to my law school studies and to look for a law school teaching position in which legal history could be part of my teaching package. I remain indebted to Professor R. Hal Williams, who so very much helped me with this project and who I tried to emulate as a mentor for my law students.