A Tribute to Joe Miller Carmichael in Honor of His Eightieth Birthday

By (his greatest fan) Lucianne Bond Carmichael; I write this story of a soft-spoken journalist because it is the one story he will never write himself.

This country, this world may not be as hardworking, inventive, and ingenious when Joe Carmichael and all the other 1927'ers are no longer among us. Born into a small ranch family in central Texas at the start of the Great Depression, with no electricity or running water, a rudimentary telephone serving 40 other "parties," Joe learned a great deal at a very early age as he padded around after his dad, Joe Gervys Carmichael, an extraordinary man, who could invent, create parts, repair and build just about anything required for his family's survival. Joe soaked it all up… and at this very moment, 80 years later, is inventing a new motor for his band saw. It's an old friend, 30 years old, without which we could not have built our home and studio. "Never waste or throw anything out. You may need it sometime." Joe's is the generation, perhaps the last, of just about total self-sufficiency. Witnessing this for the last forty years has been an enlightening and humbling experience, and is the reason A Studio in the Woods exists today as a symbol of that pioneer drive for sustainability of self and the earth supporting that self.

An only child, Joe's friends were the animals around the ranch, his pet Javelina (wild pig), the chickens whose shelter he built, and especially the horses of which he always had a special pal he rode bareback through the hills and gullies with only an old rope bridle or sometimes only with the horse's mane for stability. Joe finished high school having signed up for Armed Services Training Reserve Program (ASTRP). To his great disappointment he encountered calculus and trigonometry and realized he must forego his ambition of being an inventor/engineer. After Joe became eighteen he went to active duty and was inducted into the army at the Manhattan Engineering District, Los Alamos, New Mexico. Joe, the gentlest man I've ever known, was assigned to the Military Police where he wore a .45 automatic strapped on his hip at all times. One guard post was on the west side of the Rio Grande Canyon with the snow-capped Truchas Peak on the east side. Joe recalls that at sunrise and sunset he'd soak up the magnificent colors streaming across the canyon, and write poetry. "I would have let the whole Russian army march through the gates…"

In the army Joe took a correspondence course in writing. Upon seeing Joe's work the professor replied that he had a definite talent in writing and should "pursue a literary career." Upon Joe's discharge, "having risen through the ranks in the army from private to corporal," he returned home to San Antonio and enrolled in Trinity University. After searching for schools that emphasized feature writing he settled on the Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois. He ran into technical problems between Trinity's semester schedule and Northwestern's quarter schedule and Joe's application was rejected. He arranged with Trinity to end the semester early and so informed the Medill dean, telling him why he wanted to become a journalist and why he chose Northwestern. The dean wrote back, "I admire your spirit. You're accepted." Five sometimes hungry and very hardworking years later Joe returned to the South with a Masters Degree in journalism and began a series of Texas trade magazines and newspaper stints until 1953 when the Times Picayune hired Joe to write for Dixie Roto, the magazine section of the Sunday paper…

As space exploration began Joe moved his writing skills to the challenge of proposals and technical editing for Thiokol Chemical, Martin Marietta and finally the Chrysler Space Division at Michoud. In 1965 the very first federal funding for public education began to flow to local school boards, but in the New Orleans school system someone was needed to write federal proposals. Joe was ready for a change and joined the system as Assistant Director of Federal Projects on January 10, 1967. On that same day I was working at McDonogh 10 School teaching reading in a new "experimental" way with some of that new federal funding that had managed to trickle down to McD 10. I looked up from my kids to see a group of strangers peering in the classroom door. A man with twinkling blue eyes was standing in the back of the group. Later that day my principal, Gerd Klaveness, said, "Did you see that man with the twinkly blue eyes? He's the new man in the school system." Miss Klaveness' words and the blue eyes remained in a corner of my mind… for some reason.

As Joe began working within the school system, getting to know the various departments, going to school board meetings and visiting schools, he recognized the tremendous financial challenges impeding public education. Joe spoke with the Deputy Superintendent for Finances about the lack of funding and insufficient allocations from the state legislature. The conversation went like this:

Joe: "Do we talk with city government people about this?"
Superintendent: "No. We don't talk to them."
Joe: "Our funding allocation is too low. It comes from the state. Do we talk to the state people?"
Superintendent: "No. We don't talk to them either. And besides, that allocation is set by state law and it can't be changed without changing the law… and if you're so damn smart then you just go up there to Baton Rouge and change that law."
Joe: "Ok, I will."

And Joe did.

Shortly thereafter he was appointed "Governmental Liaison" to work with both city and state government. Joe and the Deputy Superintendent then went to Baton Rouge and into the Capitol. The Superintendent pointed to the right and said "There's the House," pointed left, "There's the Senate. I'm leaving now but I'll come back to Baton Rouge to help you." Joe never saw the Deputy Superintendent in the Capitol again. He was on his own, for good.

Fortunately for Joe the very first person he met (when he asked directions to the men's room) was Mary Zervigon, the New Orleans' chief lobbyist who generously became Joe's tutor and guide. For the next fifteen years Joe spent every legislative session full time in Baton Rouge. Many of the trips included Joe's car full of community folks, usually African American moms deeply concerned about their children's pitifully lacking education. He had met these women at numerous community meetings through the longtime guidance and friendship of greatly respected African American community activist, Rose Loving. Over the years Mrs. Loving's patient tutelage significantly extended Joe's understanding of the endemic problems of public education in New Orleans.

Joe realized early on that he could not lobby simply for the New Orleans School Board President's agenda. At that time the entire school board was white and all members of the public who attended school board meetings were also white. In a conversation with the board president, Joe explained that the U.S. government mandated that public funds had to be distributed at the will of the wider community representing all major ethnicities. He must lobby for that wider community's agenda. In this matter Rose Loving, played an important role in introducing African American activists to school board meetings and was soon elected to the school board and later became President of the Orleans Parish School Board. It is my opinion that Joe Carmichael, with the help and guidance of Rose Loving, is responsible for bringing the African American community into its first public dialogue on education with the Orleans Parish School Board and the Legislature, and that Joe persisted in facilitating this dialogue throughout his fifteen years as Legislative Liaison for the New Orleans Public Schools.

Joe started humbly, knowing he must first set up relationships with legislators’ staff members which he did with his extraordinary ability to pay attention, to observe, take notes, and to remember… and to read papers upside down on secretaries' desks, a skill learned from his newspaper-reporter days. Quietly, slowly, these staff members became his friends and suppliers of vital information and contact with their bosses.

Listening was another skill Joe realized he had absorbed in his visits on Saturdays to a town near the ranch. Joe's father was gregarious and spent hours just chatting along the boarded walkway with his buddies. Joe quietly soaked up his father's gift of interest in others and ability to ask questions. Joe Gervys Carmichael was preparing his son for the greatest challenge of his life. Suddenly, quietly, it all came back for Joe in Baton Rouge and in all the community meetings he concertedly brought into his work.

Then came Joe's integrity. Talk is fast and cheap and often inaccurate around an intense legislative session. Legislators learned they could depend on Joe for the truth, even if it negatively influenced Joe's purposes. When Joe wanted a legislator to vote for a certain education bill he would give all the information on what the bill could do for public education and the kudos the legislator could expect from its passage. He would also say "Here are the problems. Here are the folks who will complain and cause trouble… and here are some ways you can deal with that to make this workable… and give you credit too." So, legislators frequently came to Joe to talk over pros and cons of their votes knowing they would get the straight story. When things went well, Joe always credited the legislator only, never himself. Joe explained to me – a lobbyist can't claim credit for any success because its part of the job to have the school board president, a community leader or a legislator claim the responsibility for success. "As the lobbyist I am the one who gets the blame for failure, but when I'm successful I become invisible."

Based on suggestions from Orleans Parish board members and community people as well as school system staff members Joe developed and wrote the legislative program each year for the Orleans Parish School Board. It was also Joe's job to set up community meetings on legislative matters, as well as to bring board members and system administrators to Baton Rouge. They would then meet with legislators and testify at legislative committee hearings, after Joe coached the visitors on the issues before the committees and how to testify to help passage of particular bills.

Joe's work involved liaison with city government and its agencies as well. He attended Mayor Landrieu's monthly meetings of all city agencies and his job involved carrying news of education programs and needs and as well as anticipating and warding-off problems between the school system and other city agencies. One such problem was the discovery of asbestos in schools by the Health Department which was preparing to make a public announcement that the schools were full of asbestos. Joe checked with the school people. They knew and already had a plan in motion for removal. Joe, having long since set up a positive relationship with the head of the health department, talked with its director suggesting that the school system make the public announcement together with the news of its plan to remove the asbestos immediately . The Director agreed and all went smoothly in what could have been an unnecessary exposé of seeming negligence by the school system. Joe… always invisible, available and a source of reliable information and creative solution for problems… Amazing, and in the job he invented for himself… and for public education.

By 1974 Joe realized the school system also needed communication with federal legislators and the US Department of Education which created the landmark Elementary and Secondary Education Act still bringing millions to public school systems. The US Education Department announced grants for Intergovernmental Exchanges. Joe applied and was granted a six months residency in the Department of Education in the summer/fall of 1974 where he worked part time learning a great deal and making long term contacts of great help to Joe in all his future work in the school system.

Joe wrote to Lindy Boggs about his plan to come to Washington and requested a meeting with her. She, the ever-gracious Southern woman and magnificent legislator, was of tremendous assistance to Joe in learning some of the "ropes," underground passageways, and how to get audiences with key legislators. I came to Washington to spend six weeks with Joe during summer vacation and was amazed to have him take me through the Capital and all its tunnels like a "regular." One of our greatest ever experiences was sitting on the Capitol steps on the evening of July 4th, 1974 and watching the fireworks bursting over the reflecting pond and a heart-rending singing of "America the Beautiful." I remember asking myself "How lucky can I be to be in this place, at this time, with this amazing man, Joe Carmichael?" And I frequently ask myself that question to this day.

And as an aside… the story of McDonogh 15 becoming the first child-centered school in the region could never have happened without the unfailing ear, support and creative solutions to problems Joe provided me. I vividly recall driving back home to the woods in the evening thinking, "Oh, if I can only make it home to sit on the porch swing and talk with Joe!” Joe's steadiness, integrity, ability to observe, find creative solutions and his just-plain-kindness and sense of humor gave me what I needed to do the job of making the school dream come true… And then there was discovering our land together … and Joe's seemingly endless work collecting, hauling, stacking and restacking old timbers on the land, drawing the plans for our home while "sitting in a boring school board meeting," and doing a great deal of the building of the home with me as an often clumsy assistant. From this work with many of our friends and my son Tommy participating came the dream of A Studio in the Woods. Both Joe and I credit the woods for providing the peace, tranquility, beauty, inspiration, and opportunity to work very hard with many people to make this shared dream come true… all because my wonderful principal pointed out that man with the twinkly blue eyes. May they ever twinkle while I'm around.

— Lucianne Carmichael
     December 2007

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