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Name: Mary Lou (Fulkerson) McCague
Degree and Year: BJ '33
City and State: Sarasota, Fla.
Mary Lou (Fulkerson) McCague, BJ '33
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Mary Lou Fulkerson, 1932 Savitar.
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Mary Lou (Fulkerson) McCague, BJ '33, was an avid swimmer until just a couple years ago, and she still likes to get out and take walks when she can. She loves the piano performances at Bay Village, her living community in Sarasota, Fla., and she catches up on her reading with various magazines and books, the latest John Lescroart's novel Nothing But the Truth. Now 96 years old, McCague took some time out of her active lifestyle to recount her memories of being a student at the Missouri School of Journalism in the early 1930s.
City to Country
When Mary Louise Fulkerson arrived in Columbia, Mo., to attend Stephens College in 1929, she found a small town of about 15,000 people. Originally from Chicago, Ill., Fulkerson said that living in the city just wasn't quite right for her.
"It seemed as though I was always trying to get to a smaller place," McCague said.
She found that place at Stephens College, the nationally-known women's college, where she studied for two years before enrolling at the University of Missouri. She decided to major in journalism, a field still dominated by men in the 1930s despite a significant enrollment of women at the Missouri School of Journalism. The first female graduate of the School was Mary Paxton Keeley in 1910, just two years after the School's founding. In 1933, more than 50 women graduated with journalism degrees. McCague said she chose that path, instead of a more traditional female career, because it inspired her to continue writing.
"I just wanted to give it a try," she said. "I thought that was what I wanted to do. At least I thought it was an interesting thing to go into. And it was."
Mary Lou Fulkerson is thought to be in the back row, second from left, in this Theta Sigma Phi photo from the early 1930s.
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In the early 1930s, the Missouri School of Journalism was gaining its worldwide prominence while battling through the Great Depression. Dean Walter Williams, known throughout the globe for founding the world's first and foremost school of journalism, had become president of the University of Missouri in 1930. The Board of Curators specifically chose Williams to lead the University through the Depression, not only because of his connections in the state legislature but also because he exuded a sense of respect and stability that was much needed in uncertain times.
Williams maintained his role as dean of the School of Journalism, which continued to produce professional journalists through hands-on practice at the Columbia Missourian, the School's daily city newspaper founded in 1908 as a lab for students. By 1931, however, only 14 out of 141 graduates found journalism-related jobs. Times were tough. Life at the School continued, thanks to Williams' constant promotions at home and on his many trips abroad. When McCague graduated in 1933, the School celebrated its 25th anniversary with a grand celebration at the annual Journalism Week activities, casting aside the Depression if only for a short time.
Work and Play
McCague called herself a "medium" student of journalism during this time, one with decent but not extraordinary grades. Perhaps, but she excelled enough to be inducted as a member of Theta Sigma Phi, the women's journalism honorary society, in 1932. She also was a member of the sorority Alpha Phi, where she lived at the sorority house on campus. McCague was known to have her sorority sister leave a window open for her to sneak back into the house after a long date. On occasion, the date was with Windsor Booth, BJ '33, who would later make a name for himself working for newspapers and magazines such as the Washington Post, Time, Life and most notably National Geographic, where he was a member of the executive editorial council. Booth often claimed that he was the only graduate of the Missouri School of Journalism to get a job in 1933 during the Depression.
Alpha Phi Sorority, 1933 Savitar. Mary Lou Fulkerson is in the middle row, third from left.
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Many students lacked spending money in those days, but McCague said she still managed trips down to the local soda fountain with her classmates and sorority sisters. She sometimes wrote checks for her sodas, and on a holiday break at home, she learned a valuable money lesson from her father.
"I was overdrawn a dollar," she said. "It embarrassed my father. He told me, 'You'll have to watch that because you'll get a bad reputation in the financial world.'"
With that lesson in mind, McCague began to save the money she received from her father, who was president of the National Livestock Commission at the Union Stock Yards in Chicago. McCague said he was generous to her and her sister because their mother had died when she was very young. On a trip to see her sorority sister in St. Louis, McCague used her saved money to buy a new dress, which was quite a treat at the time.
As a student, McCague remembers most the copy editing class she took while working for the Columbia Missourian. From the "slot" of the large round copy desk surrounded by students, the on-duty editor would train the students in headline writing.
"He would read something and then point at one of us and say, 'How do you think the headline should read?' Most of the time he didn't use our ideas," McCague said with a laugh. "But every now and then ours would turn up, and we'd be thrilled to death."
McCague used such practical experience as the foundation for a lofty job search following graduation.
"When I got out of school - nothing little about me - I went to the Chicago Tribune to see about a job," McCague said, laughing at the memory of her own youthful arrogance. "I remember this editor talked to me a while, and he said, 'Let me tell you, dear. You go work in a small town for a while, and then you come back in about a year, and I'll give you a job.'"
McCague married shortly after that and moved to Florida, where she concentrated on raising her two sons instead of pursuing a job at the Chicago Tribune. Her husband, Jim, was a sonar instructor for the Navy based in Key West, Fla. Even though she never worked in journalism, McCague used her degree to help promote women's educational opportunities through P.E.O. (philanthropic educational organization), one of the pioneer societies for women. Nearly 75 years after leaving the University of Missouri, McCague said she is still proud to call herself a Missouri School of Journalism graduate.
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