somehow Mr Hopkins made it interesting. It didn't hurt that he had the neatest smile I had ever seen. We just had to get him to smile a little more often. Duane Brodie felt responsible to make everyone smile as often as possible. We were sitting in class on a very warm day in May, and all of the windows were open. I had a habit of scooting my shoe down to my big toe and swinging it back and forth (it sounds like a nervous habit, but what was there to be nervous about with Hoppie teaching the class). Duane grabbed my shoe and threw it out the window before I knew what was going on. Mr Hopkins, unfortunately, looked up about the time my shoe was flying across the room, and out the window. He got up from his desk, and said "Miss Hodgson, where is your shoe?" I replied, "I'm not sure." Mr Hopkins said "Mr Brodie, do you know where Miss Hodgson's shoe might be." Duane just grinned and said "I believe it might have gone out the window." Hoppie very strongly suggested that he go get it, and gave us both detention.
"Graduation seemed to come up in a hurry. As we get older, we certainly know how fast time goes by. Graduation was very special to me, not only because my high school days were over, but because I became engaged that day. However, it didn't stop me from crying at the ceremony, grieving the end of a wonderful time of my life.
"Instead of going to Teachers College in Cedar Falls, I got married and went to work at the Highway Commission (D.O.T.). I was married to Don Pierce on October 21, 1956. We had three children (Scott, Rod & Shelly), and when the last of the three (daughter, Shelly) went to school, I went to work for Howard Sandell, or Sandy as everyone called him. I was his part time secretary. It was almost like old home week for me, because Sandy's wife Lois, was my Home Economics teacher at dear old Milford High. Sandy played the piano for many of our productions, including the much loved style show that Lois produced. Our sextet sang Singing in the Rain, and Vernon Olson and I followed with Blue Skies.
"At that point in my life I had no training beyond high school. Through the years as I worked for Sandy, he began to give me more and more responsibility. He and Lois went to their wonderful cabin on Ten Mile Lake in Minnesota for a month in the summer. He said he was so glad that he had someone responsible enough to take care of the office in his absence. Sandy was thinking of retirement after I had worked for him for eight years. So he began grooming me for his job. I will forever be grateful to him for the opportunity. Sandy retired in 1984, and I applied for his job. I was hired by a three male Board of Supervisors. They had high expectations of me, and Sandy was a hard act to follow.
"Throughout the next few years the human services field changed immensely. The State of Iowa started giving more responsibility to the counties. Story County was the first County in Iowa to take over the mental health services. The Board of Supervisors appointed me as the Mental Health Coordinator. Part of my responsibility was to create programs to help the mentally ill and the mentally retarded become more self sufficient. I worked very closely with Don and Dorothy Anderson, who were the Administrators of the Care Facility or as it was previously called the County Home.
"Larry Rohret followed the Andersons as the Care Facility Administrator. We began to partner to create a program that would move the folks at the old County Home into homes or apartments in town, and help them get jobs. We receive a lot of opposition to this plan, but we had the full support of the Board of Supervisors. Larry and I submitted a written plan to the board that was available to the public for review. From that point, we held public hearings, at different towns in the county for public comment. After following every avenue to insure