Women of Fenn College Oral History Project
Jean Smith Hartman (BBA, 1958)
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Interview conducted through Cleveland State University's Mary Joyce Green Women's Center.
Transcript:
SPEAKER 1: I'm talking with Jean Marie Smith-Hartman, Fenn College graduate class of 1947. And Jean will be reflecting on her years at Fenn and her life after Fenn. But we'll start with Jean telling us a little bit about herself. Are you a native Clevelander?
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes. I am a native Clevelander. I was born on West 94th Street at home and then taken to the hospital. And I understand that the hospital billed my mother for the delivery room. And she objected to that because I was born at home.
At any rate, I lived on the west side of Cleveland until I was about four years old. And then you moved to University Heights. My parents built a home off of Cedar Road, just east of Taylor Road. And I grew up there and graduated from Cleveland Heights High School. And I always called it Heights High School because it was University Heights as well as Cleveland Heights.
While I was there, I was the school treasurer. And for some reason this evidently impressed the principal of the school. And evidently he filed something for a scholarship to Fenn. And I didn't even know that he had filed anything. And I was awarded a $200 scholarship to Fenn College. And I was very impressed with that. That's where I wanted to go, anyway. I would have gone even if I hadn't had the scholarship.
SPEAKER 1: What made you decide-- think of go on to go to Fenn?
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Well, it was a local school. I evidently could have gone to Northwestern. But I didn't want to go away from home. I don't know if you know anything about Eastern Star or their children's organizations. I was a Rainbow Girl. And I had so many friends in Cleveland that I did not want to leave. And I figured Fenn was the best thing. And it wasn't really expensive at that time. And you worked, and you earned your way through.
And I did that. I had worked at the school, in the office at Heights High School, the summer before. And I worked after as well. And I then worked at-- when I started at Fenn I worked for the admissions office. And I used to send out the material for the students that were interested in coming or people who had expressed an interest.
So this kept me at Fenn itself, and I could keep my friends at home. And this was very important to me because I had so many, because of Rainbow, and Eastern Star, and the Masonic connection.
I graduated in '47. And my field was accounting. And I never wanted to go into accounting as such. I wanted CPA work, mainly because it left so many jobs open, and you had to do everything. It wasn't just a bookkeeping job. I didn't want a bookkeeping job.
Well, the company that I started to work for was Zwick and Zwick. And in fact, one of the men just died in about the last two years ago, one of the Zwicks. And the job was posted on the bulletin board at Fenn. And I went to talk to them and took the job immediately because it was a CPA firm, and this gave me a lot of range of learning besides just keeping books.
I never did take the CPA exam. I worked for Zwick and Zwick up until the time that my husband and I married. Now, he was not a Fenn person. But he was a Cleveland man. And he had been in the service, was gone over to the Pacific during the war. And when he came back, he, of course, was on the government program for the veterans.
And we decided to get married. And he was going to Ohio State at the time. And so we went, and we looked for an apartment. We didn't like what they had for married people in Columbus. It was terrible. And a lot of the veterans were coming back. And it was very crowded.
And we ended up-- we lived with a family north of Columbus and the husband had been sick, and the wife-- they were both older. They wanted people coming into the house. So somebody that was fresh. So we had a refrigerator in the basement.
I went to work. And the CPA firm in Cleveland sent me a list of the CPAs in Columbus. I contacted one of the firms and immediately got a job in Columbus. And I worked the whole time we were down there. And my husband graduated in 19-- oh, glory. We were there about two and 1/2 years.
And as far as Fenn goes, when we came back-- well, I can't say. We were gone a period of time. he got a job in Ashtabula. And I never worked after that until my children were bigger. But it was always for CPA work.
And Fenn was a good base. I learned a lot. And we had a great time with the sorority and the people that we met. And we have kept in contact with a number of them. They're starting to die off a little bit. But it was a wonderful experience. And they were a happy school.
The men were coming back from the service when I was going there. The ratio was 13 to one, with the men to women. Which at that point really didn't matter, because I knew who I was going to marry, anyway. But we got to know a lot of the fraternity guys and all. And we had great rapport back and forth.
SPEAKER 1: Were your classes mainly all men, being that you were in accounting?
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: No. No, no. In fact, I really don't remember the classes. I really don't remember them. And somebody asked me about that one time, and what was my favorite professor? I said, I cannot tell you. I don't even remember any of the particular professors. Working in the office, with the mailing and that sort of thing-- I knew more people that way. But I don't know. This is a blank for me.
SPEAKER 1: Yeah. Yeah. And your sorority was Gamma Nu Sigma?
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Gamma Nu Sigma. And when we moved back to Cleveland-- he was in Ashtabula for a while, then we moved back to Cleveland-- we got active again with the sorority. And we used to meet. And we had yearly reunions. And we would meet at Mather Hall, or the Mather mansion.
And we would get jobs for the girls, if they needed a job and we knew of someplace where they could work, the actives. And we got them jobs. And we helped in every way we could. When they were building a float, we would come down and help them build floats, because they had parades at that time.
And we just had a great time with the actives. And we got to know them very well by the time they graduated. They came into the alumni because they knew everybody. And it's been such a treasure, knowing these women all these years. And I have sheets that they filled out that told us about their family. And I'm going to give you these if you want to make copies of them. I would like them back.
SPEAKER 1: Yes.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Because they are my old friends.
SPEAKER 1: Yes.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: So.
SPEAKER 1: Yes. Definitely. We'll get them to the alumni office and make sure you get them back.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: Yes. Yes. Yes.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: So I was reading-- I don't know how I got a paper, but it said something about Marietta [? Close's ?] husband dying. She married Sam [? Close, ?] who was also a Fenn man. And they were active all the time we were, too. And I was sorry to hear that Sam had died. But this is happening.
I have pictures from the time we were in school. These are some of the sorority pictures that we had from 1946. And we used to go each summer we'd take a vacation, and we'd rent a cottage out in the western area beyond Cleveland-- Mitiwanga I can remember. And we'd rent the cottage out there. And we'd get one of our parents to be a cottage mother.
And we had a great time. And I have pictures of that, too. The people-- we'd rent a boat and go out. We had such a good time. And we never really lost contact until just recently. And I said-- after a period of time, when Fenn became Cleveland State and we were told that we were no longer allowed to rent the Mather mansion to have our get-togethers-- why, this was the start of the breakup of the Alumni Association as well.
SPEAKER 1: So.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: I'm happy to help in any way I can. And I can tell you, it was a wonderful experience. I enjoyed every minute of Fenn, even riding the bus back and forth every day, because I never had a car. I never had a car until after my husband was finished at Ohio State. Then we could afford a car. But up until that time, I rode the bus all the time. Never thought anything about it. It was the way you did it. That's all.
SPEAKER 1: Yes. Jean, how many children did you have, then?
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Well, I have three children. And they're all local right now. We moved to Ashtabula. One daughter was born in Ashtabula, my oldest daughter. She's now Donna Jean Miller and married a young man who graduated from Cleveland State-- because it was Cleveland State by that time. He has a degree in business as well as an art degree. So he has two degrees.
Now they have two children. And the one child now is in engineering at Cleveland State. So it's kind of a family tradition. And he'll be another year, and he'll be graduating in-- I think it's structural engineering. I don't know exactly what it's called. Yeah. So it's a family like that goes.
The second child was a son. And he also graduated from Cleveland State. And he has a master's degree in computing, as well as his degree in business from Cleveland State. And right now he's working at S and Z Tool and Die. Which is not a really good company because of the auto industry and the problems right now. But so far things are going all right for him. And he's been there a while now.
And my youngest is Diane [? Bayslack. ?] My son never married. And he lives in Rocky River. My daughter-- the one I told you about, Donna Miller, bought our house in Rocky River. And we moved in here about 15 years ago.
And our youngest daughter went for a year to Muskingum. And she decided she just didn't want to bother. So she dropped out of school. Well, the older did, too. She was at-- I've forgotten. It doesn't matter. She didn't go to Fenn. Neither one of them went to Fenn. They wanted out of town. So they went, and then they quit.
But she also lives in Westlake. She's on Maple Ridge Road. Her name is Diane [? Bayslack ?] now. And her husband owns a Quiznos franchise. So they're busy with that. And she herself works for Eveready Battery. So she has kept her job, and then she works part time at the store with him.
But they are all three local, two in Rocky River and one in Westlake. I see them frequently. The one-- Diane [? Bayslack, ?] the youngest, had a daughter and then a son. And the daughter now has two children. So I have two great-grandchildren by that daughter.
My oldest daughter, the two boys are now-- she had twin boys. And the one is at Cleveland State and the other is at Lorain Community College. And they both just turned 21. And of course my son has never married. So that's my family.
SPEAKER 1: That's your family. Yes. And some of them followed in your footsteps at Fenn CSU.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes. Fenn through and through. And of course, I didn't know my son-in-law at the time, when he was going. Before he graduated, he had come and he-- well, we knew him. We knew they were going to get married anyway. And he came and he talked to my husband about owning a small business.
And he started out with the art degree, started like that. But that didn't work too well. So he was with Social Security and the government. And so they're about ready to retire, now.
Anything else I can tell you? I don't know.
SPEAKER 1: It's a lot of information. It would be nice if the Gammas when-- they were still there in '63, '64.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes, they were.
SPEAKER 1: It would be nice if there would be some way that that could come back together again--
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: --and meeting over there.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes. We would like that very much. And like I said, a lot of my good friends are gone, the ones-- in fact, I was in a couple of weddings with the girls and all. And some of them I had lost contact with. But this booklet that we have-- you'll find a lot of information about what they've done since. Any further degrees and all that sort of thing.
SPEAKER 1: That's wonderful to have. We'll take a look at that and see how it can be used over there.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER 1: Yeah, and maybe getting Gamma and some of the other sororities together again.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: I think that would be very nice. I went down, and there were-- when they had the open house-- I gave you the sheet before, or whatever it was, for the sororities. And there were a couple of Gammas there who also added on to the paper that they had on here at that time. I had this with me, of course. I would never go to Fenn without it.
SPEAKER 1: Yeah. It's your history there. Really, it's the history. Yes.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: And what a wonderful history, through the war years right up to the present.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yeah, right up to the present. After we moved to Rocky River, and my children were older, I got a job with a CPA firm in Rocky River. And I stayed with him for 35 years and worked with him for that long, until he decided he wanted to retire. And then I retired at the same time.
SPEAKER 1: What a wonderful career. What a wonderful career. And starting out at Fenn College because you wanted to go there.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes. Yes. That's where I wanted to go, and I got to go. My father was a chauffeur. And he worked for a family in Shaker Heights. And he had polio when he was young. So he was more or less limited in what he could do. One arm was withered and one leg was shorter than the other one, with the polio attack.
So he stayed with that man until he was ready to retire. And they moved to Florida. And we had trips back and forth to Florida with the kids all the time.
And my husband was wonderful. He took over his father's business when he couldn't work anymore. He had a pattern shop, industrial patterns. And he went on with that until he couldn't do any more work with the patterns. He got too much arthritis. And then he retired.
And we went, and we traveled. And we took the granddaughter. The granddaughter was older than her brother by eight years, than my youngest daughter's two children. And we took her. And we went all over the country with her. And her husband said she was spoiled rotten.
[LAUGHTER]
But we had a great time. And even after that period of time, we would rent a van. And we went to a cousin's wedding out in California. We went to Las Vegas. We went to Houston when another cousin got married. And we traveled with the children taking the big van. And we would go for a week at a time.
SPEAKER 1: Yes.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: And my husband was very willing to travel. We went to Europe a number of times and enjoyed that tremendously. We went with our son to Germany several times, because my husband had relatives that had stayed in Germany when his father came over from Germany.
And there was a parallel line. And it was funny, because my husband was in the Navy, and the parallel line in Germany-- he was in the Navy as well. They were both-- of course, the other one was in the Atlantic and Don was in the Pacific. It was funny how they were in parallel.
SPEAKER 1: Yeah.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: And we have kept in contact with them. And we've been to see them several times in Germany. We have been to Switzerland. We have been to Norway. We went all kinds of places.
SPEAKER 1: Any country that stands out in memory for you?
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Scotland, because my great-grandfather came from Scotland. But he shipped over on a ship. He worked. He was a rigger, sails. And he shipped over. And we can't find out where he came from. So we don't know just where. And his name is Angus Smith, the most common name in Scotland. So we have tried several times. Eventually we'll find out where he came from. But there's a Scotch connection.
It's fun. We have been to Scotland twice. And we took a tour with Trafalgar Tours to Scotland. And it was so interesting, because they took us through all the small towns, and all the little inns and things. And we only ended up in Edinburgh for one night. But that was the only big city we were in. And it was interesting to see the countryside and enjoy that very much.
SPEAKER 1: What a wonderful memory. Yes.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: So, we have had-- I've had a wonderful life. I cannot tell you how proud I am of my children, and my grandchildren, and my great-grandchildren. And I'm having fun.
[LAUGHTER]
SPEAKER 1: That's the important thing.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yeah. In fact, the women in here, they'll say, are you going out again tonight? And I said yes, I'm going out again tonight. I'm still active in Eastern Star, the Masonic organization. And all my children are Masonic members now. And there's always some place to go. In fact, I have a meeting tonight at 7:30 out in Berea that I will be going there with my children. And most of the time-- they use my car. They use my gas. But they drive.
SPEAKER 1: They drive. OK.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: So I really don't go that much distance driving on my own, other than local. But anyway, these other women-- they don't know what they're missing by staying home all the time.
[LAUGHTER]
SPEAKER 1: What a wonderful attitude. Oh, Jean.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: But I would love to get together with some of the Gammas, if we could make something.
SPEAKER 1: Wouldn't that be nice?
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: I will make a note of that.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: And I'm sure that they all have stories to tell. And I said, you'll find some stories in here. Now this one here is retired, living in the Florida Keys during the winter months. That's Betty Andrews. So you'll find a lot of information in this.
SPEAKER 1: That will be very helpful. Thank you. As we go along here, anything else you'd like to add?
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: No, I don't think so. I'm extremely happy. I'm so happy to be alive. I don't really have troubles like everybody else. I said my one ear is bothering me right now. But other than that, I don't take any pills.
SPEAKER 1: Oh, you're in wonderful health. Oh.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: So the health is good. My husband died three years ago. And his was very sudden. He went into the hospital with a heart attack. They fixed the heart, but after smoking for many years and the job that he was in with the industrial patterns, his lungs were bad.
And he was in the hospital for only three weeks. And then he passed away. And that was a real shock, because we did so many things together. What are you going to do? Nobody lives forever.
SPEAKER 1: Yeah. That's hard. That's hard. Yes. Jean Smith-Hartman, thank you very much for your memories of Fenn, and your life thereafter, and your work in the Eastern Star, and your travels, and everything. With a wonderful, wonderful life.
JEAN MARIE SMITH-HARTMAN: Yes. It's been wonderful.
SPEAKER 1: Thank you.
