Jeanette Alice Brauns Dixon was a physical education instructor at Oregon State College from 1930 to 1973. She previously worked at Bosse High, in Evansville, Indiana, and from 1941 to 1943 she took administrative leave from OSC to become an instructor for the National Red Cross Aquatic School. She received her Bachelor of Science in Physical Education from Battle Creek College in 1930, and her Master of Science from Oregon State in 1940. Her initial salary was $1,800 for ten months. She was promoted to assistant professor in 1943, with an annual salary of $2,400. She was married to James Dixon without children when she came to work for OSC. She took sabbatical leave from OSC in 1947 to complete a study on swimming, and later published a book called, “Simplified Swimming”. In 1967, she was granted indefinite tenure and promotion to an Associate Professor. She was born in 1907, in Evansville, Indiana.
Roland Dimick completed a Bachelor of Science at Oregon Agricultural College in 1926 and a Master of Science in 1931. He was a Professor of Fisheries and Entomology from 1929-1966.
Nellie Catherine Lyle was a Home Demonstration Agent from 1939 to 1947. She was born in 1913 in Glendale, Arizona. After completing work at University of California, Los Angeles, University of California, Berkeley, and OSC, she received a Bachelor of Arts in Home Economics from the Arizona State Teacher’s College in 1936. She received her Master of Science from OSC in 1939 in household administration. Her thesis was titled Normative Study of Growth and Development of 1938-1939 Oregon State College Home Management House Infants. During her final year of school, she worked as a graduate assistant in the Home Management House. In addition, she had five years’ cumulative experience teaching elementary school and home making in Arizona. She also co-led a 4-H home economics club. In 1947, her superiors at OSU planned to arrange sabbatical leave for her so she could take on research in additional areas, thereby allowing her to become an extension specialist in housing or home management, as they expected rural families’ needs for housing information to increase considerably. They expressed that she showed a “marked ability” for the field. Instead, she chose to resign later in the year to be married, at which point she was earning a salary of $3,456.
Kathleen Jean McCrae was a Home Demonstration Agent-at-Large from 1939 to 1941, with a salary of $2,100. She was born in 1914, in Florence, Oregon. After completing work at Oregon Normal School, San Francisco Teacher’s College, and OSC, she received her Bachelor of Science in Home Economics Education and Physical Education from the lattermost in 1938. Before coming to OSC, she was a home economics and physical education teacher in Prineville, Oregon. Before that, she spent four years teaching at rural schools in Oregon. She sought a position at OSC because she reportedly desired to work with adults and enjoy farm life. She was a member of the Oregon State Teachers Association, Omicron Nu at OSC, and the Presbyterian Church. She transferred to Washington County in 1940. In 1941, she resigned to be married.
Jane Margaret Ireland was an English instructor at Oregon State College from 1946 to 1949. She was born in 1909, in Portland, Oregon. Ireland received her Bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Oregon in 1928, and went on to study education as a graduate at the University of Washington, the University of California, and Oregon State College. Before coming to work at OSC, Ireland worked as a high school teacher in Bend and Klamath Falls. She resigned in 1949 to be married.
Sara Watt Prentiss was a Professor of Child Development and Parent Education from 1930 and Head of Household Administration from 1936 until her retirement in 1952. She was born in 1886 in Sarnia Ontario, Canada. At age eight, her family moved to Tillamook County, Oregon, where her father hoped to succeed in the timber industry. After she graduated high school, she earned money teaching in schools, which put her through her first year as a pharmacy student at the University of Washington. By the end of her freshman year, “this enterprising girl” was engaged to her physiology professor, Dr. Charles W. Prentiss. They married in the spring of her sophomore year, and spent the summer visiting his family and friends in Vermont, and briefly lived in Washington D.C. In February, they moved to Chicago, where her husband began work as a professor of microscopic anatomy at Northwestern University Medical School. They had three sons, but the first passed away at 15 months. After seven years of marriage, her husband passed away in 1915 from complications from a surgery for appendicitis. Her sons, Robert and Donald, were four and two years old each at the time. She had two options: return to her parents, as she was expected to, or support her family herself. She chose the latter. Prentiss hoped that her early chemistry training might make her employable as a laboratory technician. One of her husband’s friends discouraged this, and recommended she talk with the head of the home economics department at the University of Chicago. This person strongly advised her to study home economics at OSC, although at the time Prentiss “hardly knew what home economics meant.” She decided to go to OSC, as it was close to her parents, but intended to return to Chicago to receive her Bachelor of Science. After two years and a summer session, she received a Bachelor of Science from OSC in 1917, and accepted a teaching position. Prentiss was described as someone of “dignity and poise [whose] white hair and calm, assuring personality command the respect and admiration of her many friends.” Ava B. Milam recommended her appointment to the faculty, and wrote that she considered Prentiss to be “one of the strongest graduates” of the Home Economics Department, a “woman of broad experience,” and well-suited to handle child care for the department. Prentiss taught the first course in child care ever offered at OSU--a one credit course in fall of 1917 entitled “Mothercraft,” which mostly discussed the “physical care of the child.” As demand increased, she had more opportunities to teach varied courses: on child development, behavior problems, parent education, and family relationships, occasionally making use of a nursery school laboratory. She initially taught courses concerning nutrition, but eventually devoted most of her time to the newly-established nursery school. In 1930, she was made a full professor of Child Development and Parent Education. Soon after, the National Research Council offered her a fellowship in child development. She studied at Merrill-Palmer, and the Universities of Minnesota, Chicago, and the University of California at Berkeley. In 1930, she received her master’s degree in psychology from UC Berkeley, where she was awarded a Laura Spelman Rockefeller Scholarship. She worked with UC Berkeley’s extension service, as a parent education specialist from 1934-36. In 1936, she returned to OSC to become head of the Department of Household Administration. She reached retirement age in 1951, but they retained her on a part-time basis for the summer session, in order to teach seminar readings in Child Development and Family Relationships. Upon her retirement, she was given Emeritus status. Upon her first hire, she made $810 fro a 10 month term, and upon her retirement in 1951 she was earning $7000 a year. As for her sons, Robert graduated OSC in 1932 with a Bachelor of Science in Agriculture in the field of entomology. He was a member of the “record-beating relay hurdle team in his senior year,” and after completing graduate school, lived in Salem with two children. Donald attended OSC for three years as a science major and member of Phi Kappa Phi, and thereafter attended the University of Oregon Medical School in Portland. Both had two sons, but Donald passed away shortly before Prentiss’ retirement. She took in his children until her daughter-in-law, Marion, finished her education. She died at age 68 on August 1st, 1954. She co-authored an article titled “the Observation of Food Habits in Young Children” with Dr. Mary C Jones, which was published in the seventh volume of Childhood Education. She was a member of numerous learned societies, including Phi Kappa Phi, the Society for Research in Child Development, and the American Association of University Professors. As a member of Delta Kappa Gamma, she was nominated for a Women of Achievement award in 1956. She was also a member of the Presbyterian church.
Jane Catherine Dale was an English instructor at Oregon State College from 1946 to 1947. She was paid an annual salary of $2,000. She had previously worked as a supervisor of teaching at Oregon College of Education in Monmouth from 1939 to 1946. She came to OSC because she wanted to teach English. She received her undergraduate education from James Milikin University and the University of Delaware and George Washington University from 1927 to 1932. She received her Bachelor of Arts in English in 1938 and her Master of Arts in English in 1939 from the University of Wisconsin. She was unmarried when she came to work at OSC, and listed her friend, Miss Ruth Elizabeth Lautenbach, as her beneficiary. She resigned in 1947 to take another position elsewhere with a higher rank and salary. She was born in 1907, in Terre Haute, Indiana.