Maker of Chemists

At Illinois' Monmouth College (enrollment: 740) the chemistry courses of 69-year-old Professor William S. Haldeman are a campus legend. Even an apathetic student is apt to find that he wants to learn more & more about chemistry. And a good proportion of his classmates can count on becoming chemists for keeps.

For 42 years at Monmouth, "Haldy" has been turning out chemists by the dozens. He is a slight man with wispy hair and a strong belief in precision. When he makes his way across the campus ("I must conserve my energies. We must all conserve our energies"), he never hurries his measured steps. "Life," he insists, "should be an orderly, calm, and at the same time, exciting routine."

His classes are the same. In his starched white lab coat, with his rimless spectacles twinkling in the light, Haldy lectures quietly. Sometimes he mixes a few snatches of Shakespeare, bits of astronomy or cracker-barrel saws into his chemical formulas. He never raises his voice, but the excitement of his subject gets across.

Promising students, whether headed for law or business or banking, find it hard to escape Haldy. Unknown to them, they soon become "my boys," and he is apt to stop them anywhere on campus. "Say, Smithers," he may call out, "I ran across a book you might like . . . Just happen to have it with me," or "Hello there, Smithers, I wonder if you could help me on a little problem." "Before I knew it," said a would-be lawyer who had been subjected to this sort of thing, "I was majoring in chemistry."

Even after graduation, Haldy keeps watching. If a student needs money to go on to advanced degrees, Haldy will lend him some ("And really, I've never lost a cent"). Later, as the years pass, he keeps writing to his old students, following their careers to universities and research laboratories across the U.S. "I keep in touch with them all," says Bachelor Haldy. "They are my family, and there are too many of them for me ever to be lonely."

Next spring, Haldy's orderly routine--his starchy luncheons at Foster's dinette, his trips to the Burlington station to watch the trains ("so powerful, so straight, so exact")--will be changed a bit when he retires. But before it does, Haldy will have one slight interruption. Last week, the St. Louis section of the American Chemical Society announced the winner of its annual Midwest Award for achievement. Usually the gold medal goes to distinguished research scholars. This year it will go to Monmouth's William Haldeman, teacher and maker of chemists.

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