First Ladies of MIT - Priscilla King Gray (1980-1990) - 1994 Interview

[MUSIC PLAYING]

INTERVIEWER: Priscilla, I know that you spoke at the Women's League inaugural luncheon. And I was struck by you're commenting on three things that were very important in your role as wife of the president. Do you remember what they were, what you talked about?

GRAY: No, I probably don't. Refresh my memory.

INTERVIEWER: Well, you said, a sense of yourself and a sense of humor and a love of people. And I thought that was--

GRAY: Yes.

INTERVIEWER: Do you want to talk a little bit about each of those?

GRAY: Yes.

INTERVIEWER: Characteristics.

GRAY: I think that probably a sense of self is absolutely crucial. Otherwise, you are smothered by the job, you have to know yourself pretty well, and be comfortable with yourself, and then go on from there.

A sense of humor. I can't imagine if I couldn't have laughed at all the ridiculous things that went on, how we would have gotten through. And what was the third?

INTERVIEWER: Your love of people, the love of people. I'm going to come back to this.

GRAY: It's a people job. It really is a people job. And we kept track one year. We never did it again because it was almost overwhelming to know, but we kept track one year. And I believe we fed real food to something like 999,000 people, just under 10,000 people. And that's a lot of people in a place that is your home, as well as the Institute home.

INTERVIEWER: Well, I want to pick up on that. What about, in the first place, going to a sense of yourself? Do you want to talk a little bit about what your vision was of the job when you found out that Paul was going to become president. Do you want to talk a little bit about that, what that was like in terms of thinking about yourself?

GRAY: Well, it was really learn as we went that first year. It was a great change for me, Edith. My children were pretty well grown. Louise was the only one that was at home.

INTERVIEWER: You have four children?

GRAY: We have four children. Louise was a 16-year-old. And so she was in and out of our lives there in the President's House, but fortunately had already gone away to school, and so didn't live in the fish bowl, which I think would have been hard on a young person.

We really did feel our way along. But we had some things that we felt strongly about. We realized very early on that students came to the President's House in large part because they were leaders. They were on various committees, they were part of the student government, the fraternity conference. They were there because they were movers and doers among their peers.

And it was very easy to see the same group of students. And I worried a lot about that that first year.

INTERVIEWER: That you weren't seeing other students, you mean that that was too selective.

GRAY: That's right, that is was too selective. And so we did two things. We did a Christmas party where we really tried very hard to invite students from all over campus that weren't leaders, ones that we'd met up with in a variety of ways. And we looked over about 100 young people. That worked well and that was fun.

But it wasn't consistent. Again, we needed a mechanism where we felt as if sometime during the four years everyone had a chance to be in the House and sit down and have dinner with Paul and me.

And so we devised the senior dinners. And we invited the whole senior class. And that first February, we made lots of mistakes. We invited them and we tried for weekends, we tried for brunches, we tried for indoor picnic-style Saturday afternoon parties. We tried a variety of things.

INTERVIEWER: And what's that--

GRAY: And we learned what worked and what didn't. They don't like to get up early in the morning. A brunch was not popular. Saturday afternoon was not popular-- there were athletics.

We also decided, because we were working with a limited budget, that we would serve the same thing. Then people wouldn't be worrying that they had so and so came on a chicken night, and somebody else got fish. So we did lasagna. And at the end of four weeks of lasagna, Paul and I, I don't think looked at lasagna for another five years.

So we went into the second year much more prepared. It was a Monday through Thursday proposition.

INTERVIEWER: You kept away from weekends.

GRAY: We kept away from weekends all together. Because it's a lot of work to set up and have no one come, or have half of the people you're ready for come. And we found that about 70 came for each night.

INTERVIEWER: Out of 100 or so invitations.

GRAY: Yes, well, the whole class was invited. And they were given a postcard with dates, and they could select three choices. And then they were--

INTERVIEWER: Divided up?

GRAY: Divided up. The first year, we asked too many alumni. The idea being that the alumni would talk about what they'd done, what their interests were, why these young people should keep in touch with the Alumni Association. And that part was wonderful.

But too many-- and just one or two got carried away and recited their life story took away time that we needed for the freshman. And so we got that under control.

And by the second year, we were really in much better shape.

INTERVIEWER: Were you disciplining the alumni?

GRAY: No, we just didn't invite as many. We invited a number so that every table would have one or two. And we were very specific about what we wanted them to talk about and how long we wanted them to talk.

We did not talk a lot about what we were going to do at the end of the senior dinners, but we asked each young person to stand up, talk about where they came from, what they had done at MIT, and what they hope to do next. And it really was fascinating.

I think that they would have been very put off by that hearing about it ahead of time.

INTERVIEWER: Right.

GRAY: But by the time that moment came, it was a very natural thing. And they just went around the room, and there was some marvelous evenings.

One young person one year got up and said he lived just off exit 95 on the Garden State Parkway in New Jersey. And so then all around the room--

INTERVIEWER: Other Route 95's.

GRAY: All the exits off Route such and such were mentioned. And we had some marvelous moments.

INTERVIEWER: It sounds like MIT with its fixation on numbers, you know, course whatever, exits, whatever.

GRAY: That's right. It was interesting to see the emphasis begin to swing towards some public service jobs to much more teaching. I think when we first started, the first two or three years, we didn't have a single senior interested in teaching.

And by last year, we had five or six interested. And I'm in the process right now of reading applications for fellowships for the Public Service Center for Teaching fellowships in IAP, and we're overwhelmed. And the problem is that they're all qualified-- we just could place every one of them.

INTERVIEWER: I want to come back to that, but I want to go backwards for a few minutes and pick up on some of the things you mentioned. First, I'm struck by the fact that the pronoun you use all the time is we. And would you talk about the we aspects of the job-- what if?

GRAY: Well, one of the really hard things when you're doing a job like that is to define who you are and what you're called. And the general feeling is that, oh, you don't work, you don't have a salary. And my response was, follow me for a day and then decide whether or not I work.

But it was a partnership. And it was a full-time job. And it took two of us to do it.

INTERVIEWER: Would you talk about what other ways in which you-- I mean, did Paul use you, for example, as a sounding board when major issues were coming up at the Institute? Can you talk a little bit about that, some of the issues that arose or that were particular?

I hear one of the aspects that I'm struck with is the concern about involving the community. And were there other ways in which you saw that as an issue for the two of you to work on?

GRAY: Yes, I think there were several issues that we just sort of always had on the back burner. People always see things from a different perspective. And I think we helped each other to sort out what our priorities were.

I know that when there was a death on the campus, for instance, of someone who we had dearly loved and who was really an MIT figure-- Doc Edgerton for example. We wanted so much at the time of that memorial service to gather the people that were taking part together for Esther so that she could meet them all in a setting where it would be less formal and where she wouldn't have to be standing around.

And that worked well to have it at the President's House. And that was one of those things that we decided to do. And then it was my responsibility to make it happen. Those kinds of things just naturally fell to me.

INTERVIEWER: So it was the kind of humane and personal dimension.

Apropos of that, I remember seeing you one day in a very touching situation when Doc Edgerton was giving a speech. Do you want to talk about that when he lost his place? Do you want to talk about what went through, to describe that a little bit, because I found that a very moving moment in your role?

GRAY: Well, he lost his place.

INTERVIEWER: It was a major event. I forgot what

GRAY: Yes, it was the department's anniversary birthday party, if you will, anniversary celebration. And he had put down his notes, and those that he had already used somehow got put back on the top of the pile so he was going back to the very beginning, and we will well beyond halfway through the program.

I was next to him, and I was next to the podium. And it was clear from all the hand signals and written messages being slipped to me from the floor that they needed me to do something. And it was awkward, because I didn't for a minute want to hurt Doc's feelings, but I needed to rescue him.

And in the end, he gave me the opportunity because he said, I think I'm mixed up here. And I could just grab that section of paper that he needed to get pulled away. And he then realized what had happened, and he carried on.

INTERVIEWER: Yeah, because I remember thinking, what a beautiful moment that was and how graciously you had done that.

GRAY: Well, he'd given me that little window of opportunity, which I really needed, to do it without hurting his feelings.

INTERVIEWER: Do you think a man-- I hate to make the gender distinction-- but do you think there is a gender distinction here, possibly, that a man would have had a harder time getting up to do that?

GRAY: I don't know. I was just in the right place at the right time. And Doc and I had a relationship that went back to when I was 19 or 20.

INTERVIEWER: How was that?

GRAY: Well, Paul worked for Doc as a TA. And so all the years that we were dating, I got to know him. And then we lived near them when we came back here for graduate school. And Doc and Esther were real mentors.

As the children came, Doc would show up with a camera, and Esther would show up with a casserole.

INTERVIEWER: It's a perfect combination.

GRAY: They've just always been a part of our lives. Doc and my dad were exactly the same age and had some of the similar problems.

INTERVIEWER: Was your father an academic?

GRAY: No he was not. But they had met once, and Doc always asked about him. And my dad always asked about Doc. And I think there were just lots of bonds there that made it easier for me to do what was needed that night.

And I don't think it was a gender thing. I think it was just that I happened to be the right person in the right spot.

INTERVIEWER: But that was certainly a memorable moment, I think, for everyone in the audience. And your role was much appreciated.

GRAY: Thank you.

INTERVIEWER: I know.

GRAY: Thank you.

INTERVIEWER: Could you talk a little bit, you referred to the Edgertons as mentors and role models. Did you have any role models for your role as wife of the president?

GRAY: Laya Wiesner-- Laya and Jerry have probably been the kinds of friends and mentors to so many people in this community that everyone needs. But Jerry was always there with the right kind of advice for the two of us. And when we were trying to make the decision in '79, '80 about moving into the President's House, Jerry's advice was just wonderful.

And Laya was the one, when we decided to make the move, who urged me to do what I needed to do and get on with it and make it right so that our children would feel it was a home.

INTERVIEWER: And you're talking about redecorating and fixing it up in the way that would be comfortable.

GRAY: And establishing bedrooms for the children. Because after all, they were going to be home a lot on vacations. And she had a sense of family responsibility and how much it meant to me and how much that had been part of the decision, how it would affect our family.

INTERVIEWER: That was one of things you worried about was that if you moved into the role that you would become necessarily somewhat distant from involvement with your children.

GRAY: That's right. And there was never a time that I couldn't call Laya and know that the advice I got was what she honestly thought, her reflections on the questions posed, which was very, very helpful and very kind, and a very caring mentor.

INTERVIEWER: So now they did not move into the President's House.

GRAY: That's right.

INTERVIEWER: But they advised you to-- and on what basis? Do you want to talk a little bit about that, about that choice?

GRAY: Well, I guess I feel very strongly about that. As we did that, the community did not understand that Laya's physical problems did not lend themselves to that house. Remember that it's just been in the last four years that there's been any handicapped access, any elevator in that house.

And Laya was having terrible problems with stairs, needed to be swimming. Jerry had just build her an indoor pool. It was not an option, really, for them to move in there.

But when they realized that we really thought that it might be the thing for us to do, they were very supportive and very helpful in getting us started on planning that move.

INTERVIEWER: And you had been involved somewhat when Jerry and Laya were president yourselves in the administration.

GRAY: That's right.

INTERVIEWER: So it was not.

GRAY: Paul was Jerry's chancellor. And we'd worked so closely. And for us, it was just that in some ways a continuation, but on campus, of some of the things we'd done.

We tried to do some entertaining for them in Winchester, just to lighten the burden a little bit.

INTERVIEWER: For the Wiesners.

GRAY: For the Wiesners, for Jerry and Laya.

INTERVIEWER: Right.

GRAY: And so every once in a while when Laya was not feeling quite up to snuff and there needed to be somebody at the house for our function, Jerry would call, and Paul and I would be there. And it worked very, very well.

INTERVIEWER: So you were really a complimentary team. Now was there a change in your role from the time Paul was chancellor to when he became president?

GRAY: Oh, yes, it's a tremendous change. It's a tremendous change because, well, then it's your job. Before, you're asked to help, and you do everything that you can. But it's--

INTERVIEWER: It's much more up to you to decide whether or not you do it. Is that what you're saying?

GRAY: Well, I think you're a helper. Paul described himself in those years when he was chancellor as Jerry's deputy. And I suppose in a way I was Laya's deputy.

INTERVIEWER: That's interesting, yes.

GRAY: I was available when she when she needed me.

INTERVIEWER: Now you talked earlier about people not thinking of it as work because you didn't get a salary. Where did you get that sense from, that people didn't understand what the role was about? I think all of us in the country think about this now in relation to Hillary Clinton, for example. Do you want to talk a little bit about that?

GRAY: In those 10 years, there was a tremendous amount of discussion among college presidents and their spouses as to what a title might be. People were really searching for that. And the obvious one just doesn't spring out, yet, Edith.

I finally signed myself as partner to a university president. That was as close as I could come to an accurate, truthful description. I couldn't really put that I didn't work because I didn't have a life of my own. I really was totally involved here.

And I think you will find, if you look back, that between 1980 and 1990, that probably was the title of choice. I have not heard that they've come up with any better one.

INTERVIEWER: Well, it's a difficult role because you are accountable in the same way. And yet everyone knows how significant two people are in a marriage relationship when one has a job like that.

Now you say you couldn't. Were there ways in which you feel you lost something of what you might like to have done on your own had Paul not been president?

GRAY: I lost a personal life. But I certainly was part of a very rich experience in those 10 years. I lost the ability to have any spontaneity in picking up and doing things.

And we learned a lot about our friends. Some friends had no patience with our life.

INTERVIEWER: Because they thought they were being snubbed or excluded in some way?

GRAY: Just couldn't believe given an invitation that could move through a six-week to two-month period of time that we couldn't accommodate that. But perhaps could in six months.

And our children were absolutely remarkable. They learned to put dates on the calendar, and we absolutely didn't let things get those dates shoved aside. But they would plan way ahead. They would plan six and eight months ahead, which is not easy for young people. They don't think in those terms.

INTERVIEWER: You had weddings and births. Do you talk a little bit about that in those years?

GRAY: Had three weddings in the President's House. And then one of the people who worked for us was married in the President's House. And one of Virginia's college roommates, who got a PhD at MIT, was married in the President's House. So Paul used to teasingly say we did weddings.

INTERVIEWER: You catered weddings?

GRAY: We did weddings. And we had some little people in the President's House. I remember that we extended for some months while they made a second search for the Vests when Phil Sharp changed his mind. Our oldest daughter had twins and was very, very ill, and went back to the hospital. And I ended up spending six weeks out there.

INTERVIEWER: Which was where?

GRAY: In Pomfret, Connecticut. She already had three children, with those five little girls. Doing MIT work over the phone at night and trying to keep that household together days, because she went back into the hospital.

It was not an easy time. But that kind of emergency, you just simply have to drop everything and put things aside and move on.

INTERVIEWER: There was no conflict for you, you knew.

GRAY: That that's where I belonged.

INTERVIEWER: Yes.

GRAY: But there were other times where it was much less clear and the decisions were much harder. My dad went downhill over a period of six or seven weeks. The last two weeks were very clear that he was slipping away. And I commuted daily. They lived in South Dartmouth, and I commuted daily.

The first part of that time was a much harder call because it could have been just another episode, and he might have pulled out of it. And it was hard to know whether you continually canceled things and what you did.

That was when a phone in the car became just a treasure, because I would be stuck in traffic with a dinner party coming up fast and nobody would know where I was. And when we finally went to a car phone, it really was a blessing.

INTERVIEWER: So you had a very personal understanding of advanced technology.

GRAY: Yes, that was technology that I thought was absolutely marvelous.

INTERVIEWER: Was there some you did not think was so marvelous?

GRAY: Well, yes, I suspect that I thought the telephone was the enemy in the house.

INTERVIEWER: That you're constantly available, you mean. You don't have a choice.

GRAY: That's right, that's right. But in the car, it did work for us.

INTERVIEWER: You've talked about so many issues that reflect so much of what has happened to women over the period of time. And I know that the role of women at MIT was always a major issue during Paul's administration. Do you want to talk about that and what you have seen over the period of time you've been here?

GRAY: Well, I believe this year that the freshman class has 42% women in it. And it's such a profound difference because I've been around here for so long that I can remember classes where you had to really look for them. And now they're everywhere. And I think that's absolutely wonderful.

I think they're doing well. I think Becky Vest has continued the open houses for women at the beginning of the term. I suspect all freshmen have some homesickness, but I think some of the young women had problems where they needed just a little extra special nurturing. And I think that afternoon with just themselves coming into the President's House and being able to meet as a class was perhaps helpful. And I'm so pleased, because I think she has continued to do that.

INTERVIEWER: Now what about when you look at your own role and your daughters and your daughter-in-law, what's your feeling about the way their lives may or may not be like yours? And could you visualize one of them in your partner role?

GRAY: Well, yes, I have a daughter actually whose life is very much like mine. She's married to a headmaster of a small private school, and does a great many things that I have done through the years. She does a great deal of entertaining, she really is the partner.

One of the big differences, I think, she also has five little girls. She is chaplain for a local hospital. And I find it very heartwarming that the trustees, at each trustee meeting, worry about whether she's getting enough physical support to do all she's doing, and feel some obligation to make sure that that's in place for her. So they like the two-for-one. They like having a headmistress's wife who is active and visible and a nurturing part of the team.

INTERVIEWER: But she also has her own professional career.

GRAY: But she also has her own professional career. And the five little girls are very visible and very much a part of that role. And I think it's a mark of the times that now these trustees feel obligated to be sure that she's getting some good, sturdy physical help.

INTERVIEWER: Well, that raises the issue also of you've talked about the role of women students at MIT. What about women faculty? What do you think happens at the Institute to women faculty over the years?

GRAY: I was impressed with how supportive they were of each other. I, through those 10 years, was invited to meet with the women faculty. I think it was sort of every six or eight weeks they got together for lunch in a two-hour discussion and talked about their problems, and were candid, wanting the administration to know what they perceived as the most difficult problems, and was supportive of each other.

I don't know if that's continued or not, but I hope it has, because it's something that always needs to be pushed to the forefront. When people are interviewed for jobs, if there's a qualified woman in there, people need to really be pushing to look at that woman. Those numbers need to be worked on all the time.

INTERVIEWER: Without--

GRAY: Just as the minority numbers do.

INTERVIEWER: Do you want to talk a little bit about Paul's interest in those issues of women and minorities?

GRAY: Well, that was a passion. He was thrilled when a position was filled by a woman or a minority. But I think he felt that with all the effort, it still fell short of where he would have liked like the numbers to have been.

INTERVIEWER: Did you feel when you met with the women faculty that you were able to help the administration think about ways to be more supportive?

GRAY: In several ways. They talked about things that I knew he wasn't hearing about. And clearly, that was one of my roles, that was one of the reasons they wanted me there, was to carry the message home. And that was a very easy, straightforward thing.

The other part of that was that there were times when I felt that they were perhaps being a little unfair, being agitated about an issue that they hadn't really explained to the administration. Paul and his team didn't know what they were thinking. And you can't always act if you're not informed. And so the other part of what I hoped was a helpful role was to nudge them.

INTERVIEWER: To make themselves clearer.

GRAY: To make themselves clearer, to appoint a group of people to go in and talk with Paul and the provost and to get the cards on the table.

INTERVIEWER: Were there times in meeting with the faculty that you felt that they didn't understand, that they were not as appreciative of the job that you were doing as they might have been? Was that an issue among professional because there's--

GRAY: I suspect it was, I suspect it was. I suspect, Edith, that no one would ever say it. But I suspect that they thought that my job and my role was a strange one, and one that they would not have done. They did not perceive it as a career.

INTERVIEWER: Professional role.

GRAY: That's right.

INTERVIEWER: No. Did you wish sometimes that you were in a professional role? Would you have changed in what they would consider a professional role? Because I consider your role a professional one, although not defined that way.

GRAY: That's a hard question because Paul and I've always been a team. And so I can't imagine being pulled in any other direction. I did what I should have been doing in those 10 years. I have no regrets with that.

I did find it hard to never have time to be spontaneous. And I did finally set several priorities that were my own priorities-- the embroidery, the work at Children's Hospital.

INTERVIEWER: Do you want to talk a little--

GRAY: That I just had to do, because I needed to do something that was--

INTERVIEWER: All yours.

GRAY: Yes, it was my interest.

INTERVIEWER: Do you want to talk about the embroidery, because that brings in the Women's League in a very social way?

GRAY: It certainly does, it certainly does. The embroidery goes back to being signed up with Rene Fell's classes back in 1968 while we were on sabbatical. Friends signed us up.

When Rene and her husband-- her husband was at Harvard-- and when they decided to retire, Rene asked if I would take over the class. And at first I thought that I wasn't prepared. And then I thought, if I don't try, I'll never know. And it turned out to be just a wonderful thing.

And then as we moved into the President's House, the general reaction was, well, you can't teach anymore. And that was a little bit like waving a red flag at a bull. The bad word was can't. And I didn't quite understand why I couldn't.

The League didn't seem to have any problem with it, and I didn't have any problem with it. And indeed, it was an absolute mental health thing for me. I went in, and for those two and 1/2 to three hours, I was doing something I loved, both a creative thing and teaching. I guess, teaching really is the profession I've always had.

And I met such an incredibly wide group of people across the Institute. It was a wonderful experience. I met people I never would have known any other way.

It was the thing that made it possible for me to say I was never isolated, because I had staff people, I had people that were janitors, cooks, faculty wives, faculty, undergraduates, graduate students, foreign students' wives. It was just the most incredible cross-section of people. And I've treasured that experience.

INTERVIEWER: Well, I think you began by talking about love of people as being an essential attribute of the job. And your love of people certainly seems to have been manifest in every comment you have made during the course of our talk. And I know that your love of people and your sense of responsibility means that you have to leave for your embroidery class.

GRAY: Yes.

INTERVIEWER: A stitch in time.

GRAY: Yes, we're back stitching. Thank you, Edith, very much.

INTERVIEWER: Thank you.

GRAY: It's been a very pleasant hour.

INTERVIEWER: Well, I loved it. I just have enjoyed it very much.

GRAY: Because I think that really--

INTERVIEWER: That's when you started again.

Priscilla, I know you have a few more minutes. And I can't resist picking up on something that relates on how people perceived your job. And I know that you had some unusual experiences. You want to tell about one of them?

GRAY: Well, there were several that stand out, Edith. They really had to do with both not taking yourself too seriously, but having some sense of yourself, too. We had a change in gardeners. And more and more, I was able to have a chance to do flowers, which had not been a popular idea with a woman named Frances Driscoll who lived there in the house.

And she retired, and the new gardener came along. And I decided that I would like to give it a try. I always loved arranging flowers. And I thought that would be a wonderful thing to do.

So I took myself over to Winston's and I bought my cut flowers, and I signed the bill. And as I signed the bill, he said, you must be the new housekeeper. I'm working over at the MIT President's House. How are they to work for?

And I said, he gave us very high marks. I said that they were just great to work for, and went out laughing. And Paul chuckled about it for weeks. We just really enjoyed that.

That summer, I represented MIT at the dedication of the new wing of the MFA. You may remember that Barbara Bush came to give the dedication speech. And someone let me off at the entrance, and I got caught in the revolving door.

And it wouldn't stop, I couldn't get out. I couldn't get out on the outside, I couldn't get out on the inside.

INTERVIEWER: You've become a revolutionary.

GRAY: That's right. And suddenly, this huge burly man plucked me like a mother cat would pluck her kitten literally out from this revolving door, wedged his body in, got it stopped, got me out, kind of shook me and stood me up, and looked at me and then turned to Governor King, who was the Governor of Massachusetts at that time, and said, look, Governor, it's the housekeeper at the MIT President's House.

And he thought that because the governor is an Ex Officio member of the Corporation. And for each Corporation meeting, he would breeze in, greet all these people, open the meeting with brief remarks, and leave.

And this bodyguard had spent a great deal of time out in the kitchen with me checking on what was for breakfast and hoping there would be a crumb left over. And he never ever did get clear in his mind who I was. And so we've had many laughs over that. But I was very glad he was there at the MFA dedication that day to rescue the housekeeper from the President's House.

INTERVIEWER: Well, there's your sense of humor, again. Kept you and held you in good stead.

GRAY: That's right. Better to laugh.

INTERVIEWER: Right, right, right.