{"id":4077,"date":"2015-07-16T10:40:17","date_gmt":"2015-07-16T10:40:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/archives.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/?p=4077"},"modified":"2023-11-28T19:59:37","modified_gmt":"2023-11-28T19:59:37","slug":"students-in-cars-on-campus-the-case-of-william-odell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/2015\/07\/16\/students-in-cars-on-campus-the-case-of-william-odell\/","title":{"rendered":"Students in Cars on Campus?: The Case of William O’Dell"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Cars<\/a>
Cars along Wright Street, near Altgeld Hall, circa 1936<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Written by Ellen Swain<\/strong><\/p>\n

July 16 marks the 80th<\/sup> anniversary of first installation of the parking meter (1935), brought to us by news reporter and inventor Carl C. Magee of Oklahoma City. (1) (Thanks Carl.)<\/p>\n

As someone who has paid many campus parking tickets over the years, I will not be marking the occasion; I\u2019m sure I am not alone. Illinois students and staff are all too familiar with the appearance of that annoying white ticket wedged in their windshield wiper.<\/p>\n

Before parking meters made their debut in Champaign-Urbana in the 1940s, (2) Illinois students negotiated other automotive-related restrictions. In September 1926, UI Council on Administration,\u00a0 the campus decision-making body, instituted a regulation prohibiting undergraduate students to use cars on campus without permission.(3)<\/p>\n

William O\u2019Dell \u201931 vividly recounts his encounter with this rule in a 2001 interview for the SLC Archives:<\/p>\n

\"William<\/a>
William O’Dell ’31, March 18, 2001<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cOh I remember the [rule] that made me a 1931 graduate instead of a 1930 graduate. When I got kicked out of school!<\/p>\n

There was a \u201cno car\u201d rule at the University at that time and undergraduates could not drive cars unless they were employed. I got my parents\u2019 permission to take the family car from LaGrange down to Champaign for a big Spring dance weekend\u2026this made travel with my girlfriend from one fraternity to another easier and to go to many different fraternity parties during on weekend.<\/p>\n

I was driving down Green Street with three or four people, in route to Chicago or LaGrange, to return my car and then take the train back to Champaign on Monday.\u00a0 There was a note in my mailbox from Dean [of Men] Thomas Arkle Clark asking me to come into his office at 11:30 the next morning. This would strike terror into anyone\u2019s heart!<\/p>\n

And so I showed up and my interview with him was probably forty seconds long, and the message was that I was being expelled from the University for the balance of the semester for violating the no car rule!\u00a0 This was in May, two weeks, three weeks away from my degree\u2026Very unfair, in retrospect, a horrible penalty for such a relatively minor infraction. [In my opinion!!]<\/p>\n

\"Dean<\/a>
Dean Thomas Arkle Clark, 1910<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

[Dean Clark] named the people in the car and what direction I was going down Green Street– the rumor, of course, around the campus was that Thomas Arkle Clark had a spy ring, and that had never been documented but I don\u2019t know that it had ever been completely denied either!\u00a0 In any event, Thomas Arkle Clark was a feared dean. I had tremendous respect for him, but that was the rule and regulation that I do remember.<\/p>\n

And my father, I will give him credit… I had lied to my parents really. I told them that there would be no problem; that this was just for a weekend. He never berated me in any way, but he did say, \u2018Despite your actions, I will give you a graduation present, and that will be another semester in school so you can get your degree, because it is essential if you want to be a success that you get that degree.\u2019<\/p>\n

No, I didn\u2019t want to go back. I said, \u2018Dad I don\u2019t need a degree. I am a college man now. I don\u2019t need anything more.\u2019 And he said to me, \u2018You go back and get that degree or you will regret it the rest of your life because you will always have to explain why you didn\u2019t complete your schooling!\u2019 So I did go back for the following semester. Of course, in retrospect it was great advice, but he never turned me over his knee and thrash me or anything.\u201d(4)<\/p>\n

\"William<\/a>
William Francis O’Dell<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The \u201cno car\u201d rule gradually loosened. By 1955, only freshman under twenty-one or students on probation were prohibited from having cars on campus.(5)\u00a0Parking meters\u2026 well, they are another story.<\/p>\n

(1)\u00a0 See:\u00a0 http:\/\/www.history.com\/this-day-in-history\/worlds-first-parking-meter-installed
\n(2) Undergraduate Regulations, RS 25\/7\/801.\u00a0 Daily Illini<\/em>, January 24, 1940<\/a> for Champaign and June 8, 1946<\/a> for Urbana.
\n<\/a>(3) Daily Illini<\/em>, June 18, 1929<\/a>
\n<\/a>(4) William O’Dell to Ellen Swain, Ft. Myers, Florida, March 18, 2001, RS 35\/3\/49 , Archives Alumni Oral History Project Files, 2000-2001.
\n(5) Daily Illini<\/em>, Sept. 16, 1955<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Written by Ellen Swain July 16 marks the 80th anniversary of first installation of the parking meter (1935), brought to us by news reporter and inventor Carl C. Magee of Oklahoma City. (1) (Thanks Carl.) As someone who has paid many campus parking tickets over the years, I will not be marking the occasion; I\u2019m […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":626,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/626"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4077"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4077\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11398,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4077\/revisions\/11398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/slc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}