Back in the Day
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Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 6
Before Deal or No Deal, Who Wants to Be A Millionaire or even Jeopardy, there was the GE College Bowl Quiz program. In 1960, Vanderbilt’s team of “thinking people”—Bob Andrews, BA’62; Rollin Lasseter, BA’61; Charles Ryan, BA’63; Jon Wilson, BA’61; and alternate Jim Moody, BA’61—became one of only a handful of university teams with a string of four quiz program wins. The students and their coach, Philip Hallie, professor of philosophy, flew to New York City every week to appear on the nationally televised program before losing to Vassar in their fifth match. The competition earned $6,500 for university scholarship funds, gave team members bragging rights, and brought awareness of Vanderbilt to millions of homes across the country. The excitement on campus ranged from 70 students vying for the five team slots to what was estimated as one-half to nearly two-thirds of the student body tuned into the team’s television appearances.
Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 4
 Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 9; |
 The Vanderbilt Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 1 |
Alumnus, Jan.–Feb. 1961
Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 10
photo credit: All images are reproduced courtesy of Vanderbilt University Special Collections and Archives.
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Do you have any information about where the team members are now and what they are doing? Jon Wilson worked in the Library and truly was quite brilliant. It would be interesting to hear more about these impressive young men.
I can report on Rollin Lasseter, as he was my dad. He went on to complete a PhD in English Lit at Yale, then taught at several colleges. In the late 1980s, he became interested in high school education, and left college teaching for several years, in order to devote his time to curricular development at this level. He returned to college teaching (University of Dallas) in the mid-1990s, and remained there until his retirement in 2003. A retrospective collection of his poetry, The Cast of Valor, was published in April 2008
He and my mom had 6 children, and all of us adored him, as he did us. He was a terrific husband and father.
He died this past year (May 12, 2008), after battling cancer for many years. For anyone interested, I put up a memorial page on my photo web site: http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=7253609
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Hustler, Vol. 72, No. 8 (click photo to enlarge)
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