Read Brief Bios

My life after Macalester began with my marriage in 1958 to Charles Roth from St. Paul. We met in a church youth group while I was attending Mac and he was an electrical engineering student at the U. of Minnesota. Our first date was a sock hop at the U of M and we have been dancing together ever since — ballroom, folk dance, English country dancing and contra dancing. This hobby has taken us on many travels and adventures, probably the more memorable being a dance tour in the Czech Republic. We will celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary this summer — with an open dance!  Chuck, now a retired professor from the University of Texas, is an accomplished contra caller in demand in Texas, which keeps us on our toes.

Our first year of marriage took us to Boston, Mass., where Chuck did graduate work at MIT and I taught junior high English. I also taught school in California while Chuck finished graduate work at Stanford. When he took his first teaching position at the University of Texas, I was pregnant with twin boys, Peter and Andrew. I loved being a full-time Mom and a faculty wife.

Music became my outlet (thanks to Macalester choirs and voice lessons) and I got involved in solo work and choir directing at Covenant Presbyterian Church where I have been an active force in the music ministry for many years. I was on staff part-time and developed and directed a graded children’s choir program for over 30 years that now has five children’s choirs. Now that I am retired, I have great fun coaching and substitute directing for various ages, including the adults on occasion.

Nine years after the birth of our twins, we had another son, Rick to make a total of three active boys. My children have been my greatest teachers of both the joy and the pain in life. Our oldest twin Peter was killed in a car-truck accident when he was 33. His twin Andrew and his family live in New Jersey. Our youngest son Rick with whom we have been very close had serious surgery to remove a brain tumor in summer 2007 and is still recovering. He and his wife Melissa live in Dallas and have two adorable little pre-school sons and we travel often to be with them. Rick who has his master’s in city planning works for the city of Dallas on the Trinity River Project and is back on the job, and striving to recover fully.

Without my church family and the understanding and faith I have discovered through Bible study and prayer, I do not believe I would have had the strength to go through some of the blows we have experienced. Writing has become a delightful outlet for me — and I hope to do more in the future. My place to retreat is in a cabin on the side of the mountain up in Estes Park, Colo., where we spend time each summer. 

My husband Chuck will be coming to the reunion with me and will take the opportunity to confer with a professor from the U of M who is co-authoring a textbook with him.

I have never been to a Macalester reunion before and reading the bios others have written has made me very eager to meet everyone and reconnect – to hear more about the paths your lives have taken and to see how Mac has changed and grown. I think one of my strongest impressions of Macalester came from the lectures of our Political Science Professor Dr. Mitau who earnestly implored us all to stay active in the life of our nation, lest we lose our freedoms. One of the best things I learned at Macalester is that we are here to make a difference and that our horizons should be ever expanding. See you there!