Echoes

That’s why his long list of hobbies includes amateur radio and photography. That’s why he collects antique Coleman lanterns. That’s why he became an engineer.

“I love being around people who are technical and know what they’re talking about. The exchange of ideas fascinates me,” Derry said during an interview in his Moench Hall office. “While in high school, I used to attend Engineers’ Day each spring on campus. I was impressed by what I saw. It was obvious that Rose students were having fun.”

Derry has been having fun at Rose-Hulman for the past 45 years — four years as a student (1953-57) and 41 years as an electrical engineering professor.

“One of Herman Moench’s favorite lines about teaching at Rose-Hulman was: ‘This is fun,’ I learned from the best,” he says.
Oh, but don’t get the idea that Derry doesn’t take his teaching seriously.

Consider that he is teaching two new courses (Device Modeling, and Electronics and Interfacing) and three new laboratory sessions in the final quarter before retirement.

Or, better yet, consider Derry’s fascination with learning about microcomputers — a new aspect of electrical engineering — in 1976. He couldn’t wait to bring the microcomputer development system home. It remained on the family’s dining room table for seven months.

“We may have taken it off the table for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinner. I lived that stuff,” said Derry, who graduated with high honors from Rose Polytechnic Institute. “It was new technology. Someone had to pick it up and teach our students about the future.”

Today, Derry has two desktop computer workstations, a laser printer and an image scanner in his office. He also lists microcomputer applications among his areas of technical expertise, along with circuit theory, electronics and RF transmission lines.

“The greatest advances in teaching have been the technology. It has allowed us to accomplish more things in the shorter amount of time,” he says. “I don’t know how we got everything done previously. If I had to go back to blackboards and chalk, I would be through.”

And, like all of his faculty colleagues, Derry loved teaching and the daily interaction with Rose-Hulman students, two of whom became fellow faculty members (Keith Hoover, Class of ’71; and Jeff Froyd, Class of ’75). Another, became a son-in-law (Daryl Jones, Class of ’82).

“Three times a year you get to wipe the slate clean and start over. In what other job can you do that?,” he asked. “I also love coming to work every day. Not too many people can say that . . . I’ve been very fortunate.”

Career highlights include Rose-Hulman’s 1976-77 men’s basketball team that advanced to the quarterfinals of the NCAA Division III national tournament (“It was interesting to see the players working hard in class the morning after a tough game. That’s what makes Rose-Hulman such a unique place.”); the Hulman family’s monetary donation to the Institute’s endowment in 1971 (“It gave us the financial resources to do so many things.”); the remodeling of the Electrical Engineering Department laboratories in the late 1970s (“It improved the department tremendously and gave our students the tools to be successful.”); and working with high school students as a faculty adviser to Operation Catapult from 1976-93 (“I couldn’t believe I got paid to do that. It was fun. Those high school students respected you and absorbed everything you told them.”).