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If you knew Bill, we hope you'll consider contributing your memories to this site. Please send your pictures and stories to the UCSC Linguistics Department's computer czar at northrup [at] ucsc [dot] edu.
I came to Stevenson College, UCSC in 1968 from Guyana, South America to study Literature, but thanks to Roger Keesing and his Stevenson College course, I got turned on to Linguistics and went on to design my own major in Sociolinguistics. Bill Shipley was the key element in my linguistic training, providing courses in phonetics, morphosyntax and field methods. In the process he helped me develop a deep interest in and love for the subject, and he also inculcated in me a respect for the complexity and richness of the American Indian languages on which he worked, including Maidu. It was wonderful to see him again--after a gap of 37 years--when I came to give the Stevenson Distinguished lecture in 2008, and to see that age had not dimmed his twinkling eyes and cheery smile. I am grateful to Provost Ellen Suckiel and Linguistics Chair Jim McCloskey for the opportunity that occasion provided to see and talk with Bill one last time.
Bill Shipley was my first linguistics professor, my first advisor and mentor, my first academic collaborator, and my dear, dear friend. Bill was also the person I always wanted to be when I grew up. He was both engaged and engaging (two traits that don’t necessarily go together, as it turns out), intelligent, warm, kind, compassionate, unassuming, and just plain fun. I’ll miss him more than I can ever hope to be able to put into words.
What I can put into words is what Bill did for me. I was an accidental undergraduate, with no idea what I wanted to do. I stumbled into linguistics, and my first class was with Bill. I was sold on the whole of academia right then and there: I wanted to teach and impart knowledge like Bill did, I wanted to advise students like Bill did, and I wanted to care about what I do like Bill did. Later, when reading and appreciating his research, I wanted to do that like Bill did, too.
Bill somehow saw all this desire in me and encouraged it. He asked me to be a reader for his courses, and even to teach one of his class sessions on my own; that’s how I learned that having to teach something is the best way to learn a lot about it in a very short amount of time. With his help, I wrote a term paper on Maidu syntax and he asked me to present it at a workshop; that’s how I learned how to do research, how to put together a conference abstract and handout, and how to write up a professional-looking paper.
Bill led by example. I learned things from him that he probably never imagined he was actually teaching me. Like how to listen to students with wild and crazy (or possibly even stupid) ideas without making them feel stupid; in short, how to treat everyone with respect. I also learned from Bill that a full and meaningful life takes effort: you have to participate in it to earn it. Bill led that kind of life, he threw himself into it — and he recalled events vividly, and would retell them if you asked. (And I always asked because he was such a great storyteller.)
Now that I’m a parent, I know what Bill’s most important lesson of all was: how to love your children and enjoy spending time with them. Bill had no greater love than the love he had for Betsy and Michael, and he showed it in so many ways. I only hope that I can do the same for my own daughter. I wish she could get to know him, but at least she got to meet him. We’ll miss you, Bill.
While Bill is the primary reason I am in academia, I remember him primarily as a warm, funny, brilliant, and talented friend, teacher, and mentor. I came to UCSC in the mid-70s knowing I wanted to be a linguist, but knowing very little else. It was mainly due to Bill’s openness and encouragement that I found the idea of an academic career exciting and attainable. His office and his house were always open to whomever wanted to stop by—several of us hung out to talk about life, linguistics, and departmental gossip. UCSC had no graduate program in linguistics at the time, so Bill treated us like graduate students. We felt very special—and we were—to have the opportunity be with him. He had a disarming good nature and sense of humor that he employed brilliantly in his teaching and in his interactions with students. I remember once he picked up a piece of paper from a stack of clutter and joked that it probably shouldn’t be just laying around, but perhaps belonged in the Smithsonian. It was an original page from John Peabody Harrington’s field notes. Those who know his Oklahoma accent and his laugh can imagine how this self-deprecating, off-hand remark sounded. On another occasion, when I was wondering what language to use for my phonology project, he handed me Barker’s Klamath grammar; this was his way of gently pushing me into the most challenging project of my undergraduate career. Through it, I discovered an entire phonological literature and started reading original research—that was the turning point that made an academic career possible.
Bill was from a generation of linguists caught in the cross-fire of a paradigm shift. Although he had clear theoretical opinions, he was rarely bitter, and had an uncanny knack for searching for elegance in all his analyses. He instructed us in Occam’s Razor (which he wrote on the board in Latin) and constantly said “force yourself to get complicated” (by which he meant to avoid complication unless forced). He was the first to demonstrate to me that linguistic insight transcends the particulars of any framework.
But still, I primarily remember his warm concern and sense of humor. He said that when teaching “it helps to ham it up a little”—I remember this when I teach and hope, in vain, that I can be half the teacher, linguist, and person he was.
My memories of Bill Shipley go back to 1962, when I enrolled as a new grad student in the Berkeley linguistics department. Bill taught the Articulatory Phonetics class, by far the most fun of any course then offered in the program. Each time Bill would write the phones of some weird language on the board, then proceed to give a dictation in that language, which the students would attempt to transcribe. Their dictations would be rigorously corrected by the T.A., Terry Kaufman. Sometimes Bill would let a member of the class give the dictation, which I did once for Yiddish, amusing Bill with such items as ibergeblibene gribenes 'leftover goose-skin cracklings'.
Bill quickly became my closest friend on the faculty, a friendship that continued to grow over the years and decades, and that involved our respective families. Bill and Barbara’s kids, Michael and Betsy, were about the same age as Susan’s and my daughters, Nadja and Lexa. In fact Michael and Nadja were born within a few days of each other. In the mid-1980’s, as an undergraduate linguistics major at UCSC, Lexa took the same phonetics course from Bill that I had loved a generation before.
Bill’s departure from Berkeley in order to found the UCSC linguistics department meant that we would see each other less often, but we never stayed out of touch for too long. In recent years Susan and I would make periodic trips to Santa Cruz to visit him, always a great pleasure. We attended his retirement gala in 1991, and he was a speaker at mine in 2002.
Bill was one of those rare people that everybody loved. He was a real mentsh, a warm-hearted, generous, and fully realized human being. We are all richer for having known him.
An oral history with Bill Shipley is available through the UCSC Library here. Thanks to Irene Reti (Director, Regional History Project McHenry Library, UCSC) for sending this in.
I was so sorry to hear of Bill Shipley's passing. This sad news immediately took me back 35 years as I recalled Bill's role as the main lead in Audrey Stanley's wonderful 1976 main stage production of "The Birds" by Aristophanes. It may not be widely known that this was not only a celebration of the campus's first ten years of existence, but also a wickedly tongue-in-cheek tribute to both that and the two-hundredth anniversary of the declaration of independence by the United States. With her English background, Audrey was implying that the difficulties in setting up a self-governing society in the Cloud-Cuckoo-Land (sic) of this play contained many unrecognized lessons for both the country and the campus!
Bill threw himself wholeheartedly into his role, inspiring the rest of the supporting casts --- faculty one weekend, students the next --- to give of their best. It seemed to me then, and now, that he epitomised the energy, the spirit, and the commitment that faculty had, in their multi-talented contributions to campus life.
Ave Atque Vale.
Bill's son Michael Shipley has created a wonderful picture gallery, which is viewable here. Thank you for sharing these, Michael.
I first met Bill not long after my arrival at UCSC in 1972, and we remained friends as long as he was around. In fact he was largely responsible for my teaching my course on the American Musical (1975 to 1996). He had been teaching a play-reading course at Stevenson College, and I suggested our doing a musical-reading course together. He readily agreed, which made it easy to get the course into the catalog. After a year he realized that two instructors were redundant and gracefully bowed out, but not before we coaxed him into giving a memorable rendition of “The Company Way” in the class's reading performance of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.
I have many happy memories of him during all those decades. A caring and commited teacher, a good friend, a gentleman and a gentle man.
Fifty-five years of knowing William Shipley has left many treasured memories with this family. He became one of us. I’ll never forget the day this vibrant, handsome young linguist entered our lives. He came to learn the Maidu language from my mother and grandmother. Bill worked pretty steadily for most of two summers on our language at our home. I remember those summer months as fun times. Usually after the daily Maidu sessions Bill always found time to spend with my younger brother and myself. He always had his small guitar with him. He would sing cowboy songs and folk songs for us. When the days were hot, sometimes we would all go swimming. My brother got to go spend a few days with Bill at his summer cabin where they went fishing. When my grandmother and mom would go in search of other Maidu speakers in Plumas County with Bill, I would get to tag along, which made me feel privileged. During these times I was able to learn a lot of history from our elders.
Bill has been just like a grandfather to my youngest son and taught him the language of his great grandmother. Bill was the anchor of our language and has left a way for us to keep the language alive. I will always feel extremely grateful to him for this. Bill’s passing will leave a void in our lives that cannot be filled. He has enriched our lives beyond all measure. I could go on and on with many pleasant times remembered; of visits, travels, and events shared with Bill. It will take a long time to grasp the fact that he is no longer here; but in spirit he will always be with us.
The very first time I met William Shipley, my life was changed. Bill was a great mentor and friend of mine. He and his family have become an extension of my own. In the winter of 1997, I traveled to Santa Cruz and met the man that would throughout the years teach me about a world far beyond the one I knew previously. He influenced my views of people and politics and afforded me new insights into music, art and culture. Bill contributed to my education in every way. I will forever hold him dear and celebrate his memory through my children, with whom I may now share the knowledge he instilled in me.
The gift of Maidu, the indigenous language of my ancestors, Bill handed to me with patience and perseverance. These virtues of his, along with his wisdom and love of teaching, allowed me the golden opportunity of sustaining knowledge of Maidu. Carrying on the torch of language revitalization efforts is my way of paying forward his charity to me.
My grandmother, Maym Benner-Gallagher, was by every account a charming, delightful, and particularly memorable person; a retainer of language and cultural wisdom. Beyond this, she was capable of understanding what a young, bright linguist from Berkeley like Bill may be up to, when he came into the Sierra Nevada in the mid-1950s in search of a Maidu language informant. The task of documenting, analyzing and describing the grammar of our language simply could not have fallen into more capable and loving hands than those of William Shipley. By his repeated testament, no better informant could have been found besides my grandmother. She passed on in 1978, when I was six months old.
Their shared times provided Bill with cherished memories and the Maidu legacy with the treasure of permanently recorded language archives. Due to Bill's undying philanthropy, my grandmother’s memory and the Maidu language live on, not just in the basement of Dwinelle Hall, (the site of the University of Berkeley Linguistics Department), but in the hearts of all those with whom he gave so much time sharing and cultivating that legacy. I am fortunate beyond description to be counted in this special group.
Thank you Bill! You will never leave us! jahat bis 'usan 'asi!