Among all the many good teachers I’ve had in my life, among the very best, if not THE best, was a classroom tyrant.
At least that’s what we students dubbed him (“The Tyrant”). James Brent Norlem taught “Reporting 240” at St. Cloud State University. I enrolled in that class in 1977.
On the first day, Norlem strode into the room and within minutes was fiercely writing three large words on the chalkboard, then he pointed to the words, turned to us with a loud look and practically shouted: “Good people! Accuracy, Accuracy, ACCURACY!”
I thought, “OK, boss man, we get the point!”
Norlem often acted like a mean boot-camp drill instructor in an old Army movie. In fact, we learned he’d been in the U.S. Marines, became a newswriter and hailed from Colorado.
In just a few days, the number of students in that class dwindled, some of them having dropped the course because of Norlem’s blustering outbursts. I hung in there, figuring I could be just as defiant and ornery as he is.
We students sat at tables in front of the typewriters. One day, I sat at the back next to a young woman, fresh out of high school, who suddenly took out a paint-by-number picture of Mickey Mouse and began to paint.
I whispered intently: “Hey, if I were you, I’d put that away. Like now!”
“Why?” she whispered so innocently.
“Cuz if HE happens to see it, he’ll raise holy hell, that’s why!”
Moments later, Norlem was lecturing, walking between the rows of desks. Just then, I saw him cast a daggered look at the painter.
“Since when” he roared at her, “is this a PAINTING class?!”
I thought, “Jerk! He didn’t have to shame her like that.”
Acutely embarrassed, blushing, she put Mickey away in her backback. Next day, she wasn’t in class. Another drop-out.
After three or four weeks had passed, it began to dawn on me that there may be a method to Norlem’s madness, his meanness. Here’s a teacher who wasn’t namby-pamby. He meant business, and if we didn’t like it, tough luck. He was going to teach us and we’d better learn right, or else we had two choices: flunk or drop out.
When reading our news stories, if the ogre found just one error of fact, he’d slap the story with a grade of D.
One of his favorite blustering mantras was this: “Good people! Double-check facts, triple-check facts!! Get them right. Be accurate!”
I still recall how in one of my news stories I mentioned a literary magazine: “Wheatsprout.” Ol’ Eagle Eye caught the error. He underlined it with a slashing bold black marker and wrote, “It’s Wheatstaff, not Wheatsprout.” Oops! I guess I’d earned that D grade.
From then on, I’d write a story, then scrutinize it over and over like a bloodhound sniffing for errors. I improved to the point where I actually received some scribbled compliments from the curmudgeon: “Good work!” “Nice job!” “Yes, THIS is the way to do it.”
One day, however, I put my foot in my mouth. He asked us what one thing we would do to improve newspapers. I raised my hand.
“Yes, Dalman?” he asked.
“I’d get rid of all the advertisements in them. They’re distracting.”
Norlem turned an icky shade of purple. His chest seemed to swell. He gritted his teeth and broke the piece of chalk he was holding. We students cringed and winced.
“Dalman! Where do you think revenue comes from to pay for newspapers?!”
“Subscriptions?” I lamely replied.
“NO! Ads! Get that through your head.”
Norlem wasn’t exactly Mr. Nice Guy, but he was in fact a first-rate teacher.
To this day, when proofreaders or readers notice I made an error of fact in a story, oops!, I can hear “The Tyrant” yelling in my head, “Accuracy, Accuracy, ACCURACY!”
Sad to say, Norlem died in 2020, age 87. But, glad to say, he’s STILL teaching me.
