Professor brings blasts from the past
David Rich Lewis, history professor, is a man of mystery. In front of a classroom of 250 undergraduate students he puts on a rambunctiously educational show; in personal conversation he is reserved and genuine. He said he enjoys studying the minute details of human nature and culture, yet thoroughly rejoices in his own privacy, making him a bit of a contradiction.
A child of the late ’60s and ’70s, Lewis said he barely missed the draft. He entered Utah State University as an art major, pursuing photography. It didn’t last. He had a good eye, but not in the way necessary to make it in the artistic world, he said.
Instead, Lewis said his love for current events and his ongoing endeavor to make sense of the post-Vietnam world led him headfirst into the archives of history and political science.
While many are drawn to study history for the romantically pleasant moments and peaceful lulls between wars, Lewis said he found himself utterly engaged in primary research, challenged to step back from any of his preconceptions.
“I was attracted by difficult, uglier moments where we kind of have to look at human nature and wonder why,” Lewis said. “I was touching stuff that people hundreds of years ago created, reading what they never intended for me to read.”
Lewis graduated from USU with his bachelor’s, earned a master’s degree at the University of Toronto and yet another master’s as well as his doctorate at the University of Wisconsin – Madison.
Lewis returned to USU in 1988 to conduct research and teach courses on American history and American Indians. He is the editor of “The Western Historical Quarterly” and collects and restores fountain pens from the early 20th century.
Lewis has a collection of neckties exclusively for when he teaches USU 1300: U.S. Institutions, a class that is more of a production than a lecture. From Dalmatians and The Beatles to Jerry Garcia and cars with fins, Lewis said he flaunts his neckties as objects of irony. They were collected throughout the 1990s, a period of “tie whimsy,” he said.
“If you’re going to wear a tie, it might as well reflect an outrageous personality,” he said, “even if I don’t have one.” With the ties and other rousing antics, Lewis said he aims to periodically wake students’ brains and cause them to think on their feet.
Lewis’ courses on the history of Utah and Native American ethno-history are similar to conversations that span a semester, and he said he is passionate about his research generating knowledge which is then fed directly back into the classroom.
With so much of his time cooped up in stuffy buildings conducting research and attending endless meetings and teaching, Lewis said his favorite recreational activities take place out of doors. In the past he enjoyed hiking, backpacking, skiing and ice-skating. More recently he has established footholds in bicycling, golf and gardening. His front yard is his canvas, rather than a lawn to be mowed, he said.
“Home is a refuge from history,” Lewis said. Home is where his many novels are stashed, though he struggles to pick a favorite. When forced, he eventually selects Wallace Stegner’s “Angle of Repose,” valuing its mix of history, memory and fiction.
Lewis said home is where he builds a growing collection of art: landscapes, figurative, surreal, and he said he collects whatever captures him.
“I am floored by the creativity I see in people,” he said.
Lewis said he is both charmed and annoyed by the people of Cache Valley, prompting frequent travels through South and Central America, Europe and China. He said he and his wife are enthusiastic about showing their two daughters the world.
The same two daughters fully support their father in all of his outrageous tie, post-hippie glory. So entirely so, that Lewis said they insist he never cut the braided rat-tail that he tucks into the backs of his shirts. While he once took great pride in wearing it publicly, he said it is now a personal reminder of his grad school days, a private conversation with himself.
“Shock value no longer interests me,” he said.
Lewis said he may have grown out of his grad-school past, but the inner “wannabe hippie” remains. And he said maybe, if you’re lucky, he’ll show you his braid.
– noelle.johansen@aggiemail.usu.edu