Gary Greenfield, first full-time president of Wisconsin Lutheran College, retires this year
By David Niles, SBT Editor
The windows from Gary Greenfield’s president’s office at Wisconsin Lutheran College offer a view of students bustling about a tidy campus and of newly built dormitories for those students at the growing institution.
It’s quite a different picture from 28 years ago when the college on Milwaukee’s west side was in its infancy, operating out of nearby Wisconsin Lutheran High School and without much of plan for its future.
The facility and property that now house the college had been a convent of cloistered Catholic nuns and a school for wayward girls – the House of the Good Shepherd. But the girls’ school was closed and the nuns moved on, leaving the property in disrepair when the seeds of Wisconsin Lutheran College were sprouting.
Greenfield was working at the high school as a school coordinator, working with 44 elementary schools that supported Wisconsin Lutheran High School, which is affiliated with the Wisconsin Synod.
He liked his job at the high school, and when asked to serve on the original board for the college, chose not to. "I just wasn’t interested in the process," he recalled in a recent interview with Small Business Times.
The interest came about.
Greenfield, a South Dakota native who turned 65 in the fall, is retiring as president of the four-year, liberal arts college in July. A replacement for Greenfield – the college’s first full-time president – is expected to be named this month.
When Wisconsin Lutheran College was founded, it had a handful of students at the time – students who were taught by Wisconsin Lutheran High School staff at the end of the high school day. The board was looking for a president to help carry the college beyond that level, and, after six or seven attempts to find the right person, approached Greenfield.
"Initially, I wasn’t interested," he recalled. "But then I started to think about it, and I said I would do it."
The college had purchased a home across the street from the high school – purchased on the signatures of the board with no down payment. It would be Greenfield’s office for two years, and a place he still has fond memories of.
The next step would be to find a home for the college separate from the high school. "Our vision was modest: a mothballed elementary school or an office building," Greenfield said. The board had its eye on a nearby office building on Blue Mound Road, but the timing wasn’t right.
But the manager of the building called back later to inquire whether the college was still looking for space. If so, he had heard that the Good Shepherd facility, also on Blue Mound Road, would be available.
"They wanted $750,000, and we had no net worth," Greenfield said of the proposal to buy the convent and school. But the college was offered the property for just $10,000 down. "We didn’t even have that, but between a Monday and that Thursday we raised $12,000. It was just something that we had to do."
Volunteers
On Sept. 2, 1977, Wisconsin Lutheran College took ownership of the property. Greenfield, his wife, Sandra, and many other volunteers took it upon themselves to start cleaning up the property. "It was not in move-in condition," he noted.
Help came from others, too. The owner of Bill’s Power Center showed up to cut the lawn, for example.
And it was all being done on faith, Greenfield said, as there really was no solid plan for the college. "There were not a lot of details to what we were doing; we just did it. It was a tremendous act of faith."
With about 25 students, the college moved into the Good Shepherd facilities. But it would be another five years – 1982 – before the college really looked to the future, according to Greenfield.
The demise of two other institutions in 1982 would help shape that future. First was the closure of Milton College. Greenfield called to inquire about purchasing Milton’s library. "Our library was a bunch of books sitting on chairs," Greenfield said.
Milton College, it turned out, was in the hands of the Bank of Wisconsin in Janesville.
"We offered the bank $35,000 for the books, but the City of Milton wanted them, too, and offered $37,000," Greenfield said.
Wisconsin Lutheran pressed for further negotiations, and ended up winning the books for a bid of $57,105.
"It was still a bargain," Greenfield said. "Just the labor alone would have cost us millions."
On July 25, 1982, "one of the memorable dates" for the college and Greenfield, volunteers moved the books to Milwaukee.
The next day, the University of Wisconsin closed a science center in Medford, presenting another opportunity for Wisconsin Lutheran. "We bought the entire contents of the center," said Greenfield.
With its newfound amenities in hand, Wisconsin Lutheran’s directors determined they wanted more than a junior college, which is was at the time. "We set out to plan the future, and it’s been a vision-driven operation ever since," said Greenfield.
Funding the dream
To become a four-year college, the board figured it needed $2 million to $3 million – funds it garnered within two years.
"People really wanted to support the dream," Greenfield said of the fund-raising effort.
In 1987, the college’s first 12 seniors graduated.
It’s been growth since then, with recent activity revolving around building projects to accommodate the rising student population. A student center, dormitories (78% of the students live on campus) and other educational spaces have been built on the campus at 8800 W. Blue Mound Rd. – property that straddles the Milwaukee-Wauwatosa border. Bids are being sought for a new science hall.
"We’re over capacity now," Greenfield notes. "There’s a great debate on how big this college should be."
And that debate has spilled over into the community, at times pitting the college against its residential neighbors and against forces that are against Wisconsin Lutheran’s hopes to build athletic facilities on the nearby Milwaukee County Grounds.
But despite the crowding, "we couldn’t be happier to be here," says Greenfield. "We plan to stay here."
Greenfield sees Wisconsin Lutheran as part of the fulfillment of the development of Lutheran education in America. While the Lutheran churches that came to form the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America early on created colleges to help Americanize immigrants, Wisconsin and Missouri synod churches typically opened elementary schools in efforts to retain European heritages, according to Greenfield. Colleges of those synods tended to be for persons entering church ministries.
"We’re part of the last step in the historical progression of Lutheran education in America," says Greenfield.
But Greenfield takes no credit for helping foster that progression. "The Lord has blessed us," he reflects. "At times, you’d like to take credit for it. But so much of it has been a gift; we would just pray that it would happen. It was just the Lord blessing us; there is no other way to look at it."
Greenfield came to Wisconsin as part of a teacher-education program; he was the founding principal – in 1959 – of Siloah Lutheran School at 21st and Nash streets in Milwaukee.
With his impending retirement, Greenfield won’t be far away; he and his wife will remain in their home of 32 years, about a mile east of the college. Sandra, a teacher at Fairview Lutheran School, will continue working.
The couple is planning an autumn ride to the West Coast on their Harley-Davidson Ultra Classic. And Greenfield has been approached by several organizations for activity, but he’ll wait until his retirement to make any such commitments.
Retirement could also give him more time to spend at the Greenfield home in Eagle River – and time to enjoy snowmobiling. "And I’ve even thought of going to school, learning new things or renewing what I’ve already taken in," he said.
While "the idea of retirement isn’t pleasant at all," Greenfield says, he told himself 10 years ago that he would retire at age 65. That time is now.
Feb. 7, 2003 Small Business Times, Milwaukee
