A TRUE COMMUNITY COLLEGE

In the spring of 1967 when Flathead Valley Community College was first created, Bill McClaren, the newly-anointed dean of students, was expecting about 200 people to enroll in the fledgling school.

More than 600 signed up.

“Almost every hour I’d have a new student come in to my office who heard about it on the radio,” McClaren said last week.

As FVCC celebrates its 50th anniversary next month, McClaren, 88, is the last surviving member of a team of Flathead Valley visionaries who helped bring the school from an idea to reality.

The idea of a community college in the Flathead started out about three years prior. McClaren was a high school counselor and math teacher at Flathead. Owen Sowerine was the school board president.

McClaren, who had been at the school for 12 years, had returned to the Flathead after taking a year off to get his master’s degree in counseling from Columbia University.

McClaren said he started to do some research on the graduating seniors and found that just 7 percent of Flathead Valley graduates were going on to college. In Missoula, that number was closer to 40 percent.

Students weren’t even thinking about college, even though educators knew they had a bright and talented student body.

“I’m going to work for my dad and cut Christmas trees,” was one response McClaren recalled from a prospective student.

That would not do.

“The chairman of the board (who was Sowerine) was wild,” McClaren recalled.

Sowerine took up the charge to change that and spent the next three years traveling the country looking at higher education alternatives. The decision was made to form a community college — a school that would take anyone and offer both academic and vocational classes.

A public relations campaign commenced — Sowerine lobbied any business and civic organization that would listen to him.

“He was a go-getter,” McClaren recalled. “He carried two filing cabinets worth of material with him.”

Thelma Hetland, a farmer’s wife and former teacher had connections with the Federated Women’s Clubs, McClaren said. Norm Beyer was the head of the local job service and saw the young people who needed the training and Les Sterling, the owner of KOFI used the airwaves to promote the school.

McClaren, with his background in education, visited the prep schools in the valley to stump for the new college.

In April, Flathead Valley residents approved a bond election to form the new school by more than 1,000 votes. McClaren said support from the Columbia Falls community was key, as was support from women, who wanted to go to college.

But there was a problem. The school was approved in April, but funding wouldn’t come in until July 1 to actually pay anyone.

There was no time to waste. The school was starting classes Sept. 1.

McClaren recalled that a Kalispell businessman donated $13,000. That was enough to pay the staff, including Larry Blake, who was the new school president and McClaren, who was the new dean of students.

They set up offices in the old Great Northern depot in Kalispell, which was vacant.

“It was a place for bums to sleep and for birds to live,” McClaren said.

Blake washed it out with a fire hose. They made offices upstairs in what were bedrooms and a student center, library and a couple of classrooms downstairs.

That wasn’t nearly enough. Flathead High School let them use classrooms at night. The next year they also held classes at the Old Elks Building as well as two or three bars. Bars were good classrooms because they didn’t open until 2 p.m., McLaren noted. Flathead County let them use an old shop so they could teach automotive classes. They taught forestry at the county fairgrounds. First Federal Bank and Loan paid Leo Shepherd’s salary while he managed the business side of the college. Tuition that first year was $67 a semester.

The school started with nine faculty members. In 1968, the Anaconda Aluminum Co. donated the first computer — it took up an entire room.

Blake got the school accredited. They struck agreements with the four-year schools in Montana so credits would transfer. In 1969 they moved to the Montana Hall at the historic Central School. Over the course of the next two decades, they utilized other buildings in Kalispell as well.

Everyone pitched in and helped. They didn’t have janitors, so faculty wives helped. Blake’s wife was scrubbing the steps of the Elks Building as a national evaluation committee came up the stairs for a visit.

Later that same day, the committee had dinner at the Blake’s house, McClaren recalled.

“You look awful familiar,” the president of the committee said to Blake’s wife as she served them dinner.

Mrs. Blake feigned indifference.

The college moved to its current campus in 1989 and the first classes were in 1990. Today it serves more than 3,500 students and has more than 100 academic programs.

McClaren never thought it would become what it has.

“No,” he said. “I could have never imagined it.”

The college will celebrate its 50th anniversary on April 7 at a free event on campus. Founders’ Day will take place in the Arts and Technology Building from 5 to 8 p.m. and will feature a special anniversary tribute, historic displays, live music and complimentary food samplings as well as visits from past and current faculty, staff and students.

The celebration is free and open to the public.