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Hugh Fox III
Introduction
This autobiography is divided into five sections that include this introduction, my family background, bloody fifth and professor days. The approach is basically chronological but I d...view moreIntroduction
This autobiography is divided into five sections that include this introduction, my family background, bloody fifth and professor days. The approach is basically chronological but I do believe that each stage in my life has had a central theme. The focus of each section will be on what I learned from that particular stage in my life.
Family Background
Both my parents are retired professors. The house was always filled with books and intellectuals. They both had extremely successful careers at Michigan State University. My father is Hugh B. Fox Jr. and has a Ph. D in American Though and Language. My grandfather was an MD and was Hugh B. Fox senior. I am Hugh B. Fox III. I think from my earliest years it was expected that I would get a doctorate and continue the family tradition. I suppose if I had a son then he would be Hugh B. Fox IV and would also be expected to get a doctorate. Some of my father friends include the famous American beatnik authors Allen Gingsberg, and Charles Bukowski. I often talked with Gingsberg and Bukowski and got a lot of interesting ideas about life from them and other similar friends of my fathers. I was a teenager at the time and they gave me some great advice about school, girls, and life in general.
My mother is from Peru originally but got her Doctorate at Illinois State University and spent the next 30 plus years of her life doing research and teaching in the area of Spanish Literature. The fact that my mother is from Peru means that I basically grew up in a bilingual/bicultural household. I was very aware of both US and Latin American intellectual traditions. My mother had very different friends than my father including Luis Borges. Luis Borges is an Argentinean who won the Nobel Prize in Literature. Borges viewed the world in a totally different way than someone like Gingsberg or Bukowski and he would often ask very enigmatic questions in the middle of a conversation. Years later I realized how lucky I was to have an opportunity to talk with some of the great thinkers of our generation as a teenager.
My mother also made sure that I went to Latin American schools for three years do that I would realize there was big world past the border of the US. I was in a Venezuelan school for fourth grade and fifth grade. I was in a public school in Argentina for seventh grade. I also visited Bolivia, Peru and Mexico while growing up. I do speak, read and write Spanish fluently thanks to my mother’s efforts. My mother and father were connected to very different intellectual traditions but from both of them I gained an enduring belief and love in the intellectual method for figuring out problems both cosmic and mundane.
Bloody Fifth
I got my bachelor’s and did not go straight on to get a Master and Doctorate and then become a professor as my parents expected. I felt that I needed some life experience above and beyond going to school. With my brand new teaching certificate, a 20-year car and 200 dollars in savings I drove to Texas from Michigan. At the time the Texas economy was booming and teaching jobs abounded. Michigan was the rust belt and teachers were being laid off. I could justify my move on economic grounds but in truth it was time to hit the open highway like so many young Americans before me. I am sure Bukowski would have approved and asked to have a beer in Texas for him. Borges probably would have asked some question like “Are you looking for a job or yourself?”. Both views have their place.
I had asked various Texan friends in Michigan about what school to teach in or not teach in and they all assured me that I wanted to stay far away from the fifth ward in Houston also affectionately known by the locals as “bloody fifth”. I was told that gunfights and knife fights were commonplace and that a student would probably kill me within a month. This sounded like the wild, wild, west that a young man needs to experience in order to understand life more deeply. I of course made sure to get a teaching job in the fifth ward. My friends had exaggerated. Actual killings of teachers were not commonplace. Rather the students assaulted each other which in turn caused many teacher to become nervous, who knows why, and in turn quit. I taught in Fleming Middle School for five years. The room next to mine saw fifteen teachers come and go in that period. I learned that courage and calm can get your through just about any experience. I also learned that sometimes you are most needed where you are least expected. Any good karma I have garnered in this lifetime was during those five years teaching at Fleming.
Professor Days
Even the panorama of the struggle between life and death can become commonplace with time. I had done my five years at Fleming and realized it was time to follow the family tradition and become a professor. I went to Texas A&M University for five years and got my Masters and Doctorate.view less