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Wednesday, Aug. 19, 1987/University Daily Kansan
Many KU grads make homes in Lawrence
By MARK JOST Special to the Kansan
By MARK IOST
Students coming to the University of Kansas this fall may want to take a good look at Lawrence. They may be living in this city longer than they think.
The Adams Alumni Center figures show that about 9,600 KU alumni live in Lawrence. Some alumni get into the Lawrence school system. Some just decide to stay, said Ann LaPointe, data entry operator at the alumni center.
Bill Immer and his wife, Miriam,
2123 Greenbrier Drive, returned to
Lawrence in 1983 after being gone
more than 50 years.
"A lot of a retiree move from the familiar to the unfamiliar," Immer, 83, said. The Immers took a different approach.
"When you think about moving to an enjoyable place, you think of moving to familiar grounds where you struggled and persisted until you won," he said.
For the Immers, those familiar grounds are Lawrence. Bill came to KU in 1822 from Marion, about 120 miles southwest of Lawrence.
"I was really lost and didn't have any confidence in myself, but some of my professors kept encouraging me," he said. He graduated from KU in 1927 with a degree in electrical engineering. His wife, Miriam, 81, graduated from KU in 1927 with a music degree.
During the next 50 or so years, he kept in touch with KU. He was involved in KU alumni associations in Chicago, St. Louis, Philadelphia and Schenected, N.Y., and was a
charter member of the advisory council of the Greater University Fund. He also recruited KU graduates when he worked for General Electric in Kansas City, Mo.
Immer even "recruited" his two daughters, Carol Nicholson and Joy Appel, for KU. He said he told them they could attend any university they wanted, but if they chose KU, he would pay part of their expenses.
When retirement in the mountains of Colorado near Buena Vista became more work than fun, the Immers considered leaving. After visiting Alamar in Lawrence, they decided to move there to be closer to Nicholson, who lives in Topeka.
Topeka had little to offer Immer and his interests. Lawrence had KU with its alumni activities and music.
"Lawrence was a natural place to come back to." Immer said.
Linda Clark, 49, 1411 Sunset Drive, also covered many miles during her return to Lawrence.
Clark received a teaching degree from KU in 1960. She taught in the Shawnee Mission schools while her husband, Ray, went to dental school. They lived in the Philippines for two years during her husband's service in the Air Force and spent two years in Oregon during her husband's residency.
"We spent four months looking for a town that we liked as well as Lawrence," Clark said. "We couldn't find any on the West Coast, so we came back here."
"Though we came back in the riots of 1969, we still found Lawrence a good place to live and raise a family," she said.
Clark's husband opened an office in Lawrence, and Clark stayed home with the children. Three years ago, she went back to teaching.
"We liked the fact that we had friends and acquaintances here," Clark said. "We liked the warmth and Midwestern friendliness that we didn't find on the West Coast."
Being close to the facilitics and resources at KU also made Lawrence appealing, she said.
Annette Bartel, 29, 836 N. Maine St., graduated in 1985 with a bachelor's degree in sociology. She is an assistant supervisor on the diagnostic unit in the Children's Hospital at the Menninger Foundation in Topeka.
"I wanted to stay here," Bartel said
She likes Lawrence's location, near Kansas City but not in the city and not too far from her family in Newton. Lawrence is pretty, not "scummy" like Tooneka, she said.
"When you bike ride (in Topeka), everybody whoops and hollers at you and yells at you to come over," she said. "It's real degrading to females there. I'm more afraid when I'm there. My boyfriend lives in a part of town that is really scary. There really aren't parts of Lawrence that I've been by that give me the same feeling."
"Lawrence's parks are well-kept," she said. "When you go uptown there are caretakers watering the trees. It's not like that in Topeka."
The people are nice. There's all kinds of people because of the college, which gives a more cosmopolitan feeling. It's the best of both worlds.
"When I'm downtown on Saturday or Sunday I have the same kind of feeling that I would get when I was in Seattle," she said. "It's real green."
"It's got the small-town feel to it, but it's not as boring as a small town," she said.
Mick Ranney, 35, 1339 Massachusetts, graduated from KU in 1974 with a bachelor's degree in history. Ranney left Lawrence several times, once to join the merchant marines and once to live on the West Coast, but he always came back.
He said he liked the northeast part of Kansas more than the rest of the state. He also likes what KU has to offer.
"The University offers a lot of stuff, whether or not you're a student," he said. "There are all sorts of lectures to go to and movies at SUA (Student Union Activities) and just a lot of facilities that you can have access to."
After graduating from KU, Ranney worked part time and traveled, using Lawrence as a base. For most of his time in Lawrence, Ranney has created his own jobs. He started a company that roofed and painted houses. He managed a bike shop and later started his own.
"There wasn't a day that I didn't enjoy it, but I realized I got tired of it after awhile," Ranney said. "It involved a lot of work. I put in many 80-hour weeks."
Ranney sold his bike shop (now Uptown Bicycles) and opened Footprints Shoe Store, 1339 Massachusetts St., in 1983.
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