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WSU President Scott Olson 2023 - Welcome Remarks
No full textWinona State University President Scott Olson welcomes you to the 2023 Ramaley Research Celebration (poster sessions) and the 2023 Research & Creative Achievement (RCA) Day
Inaugural Address: The Island of Hopes and Dreams: Scott Olson 15th President of Winona State University
No full textThis document is the inaugural address, titled The Island of Hopes and Dreams, given by Dr. Scott Olson at his inauguration as the 15th President of Winona State University. The inauguration address is dated April 19, 2013https://openriver.winona.edu/presidentspapers/1001/thumbnail.jp
Larry Scott McLean
No full textLarry Scott McLean oral history interview as conducted by Norm Olson. <br/.
Larry McClean began his federal career with the Bureau of Reclamation in 1972 as an Environmental Specialist and Resource Planner, working in various other sectors leading him to apply for, and was selected as, the first Refuge Biologist on the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge. In 1992 he wrote “The First Ten Years: A brief history of the biological program on the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge.”
Organization: FWS
Name: Larry Scott McLean
Years:
Program: Refuges
Keywords: Biography, Biologists (USFWS), Employees (USFWS), History, Adaptive management, Adults, Aircraft, Military, Aquatic birds, Bird banding, Birds, Boats, Buildings, facilities and structures, Camping, Ceremonies, Collaboration, Communication, Conservation, Conservation science, Dams, Ecosystem recovery, Environments (Natural), Equipment, Fire, Flowering plants, Game management, Human1
Oral History Cover Sheet
Name: Larry Scott McLean
Date of Interview: September 16, 2005
Location of Interview: Red Lion Hotel, Portland Oregon
Interviewer: Norman Olson
Approximate years worked for Fish and Wildlife Service: 30+
Offices and Field Stations Worked: Bureau of Reclamation, Bureau of land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, Fairbanks Alaska, Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge
Positions Held: Environmental Specialist and Resource Manager, Resource Area Biologist, District Biologist, Field Biologist
Most Important Projects: The First Ten Years: A brief history of the biological program on the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge.
Colleagues and Mentors: Red Sheldon, Lou Swenson, Roger Kaye, Norman Olson, Mike Smith, Jerry Stroebele, Bob Bartels, Jim Clark
Most Important Issues: Great Canvasback Lake Duck Caper
Brief Summary of Interview: Born and raised in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and raised by his grandparents who died in 1958. He then went to live with his aunt and uncle in San Antonio, Texas, and graduated from high school there in 1961. After graduating, he served four years in the Air Force then went to work in the public sector for a year before attending the University of Idaho, receiving a Bachelor and Master’s degrees in wildlife management in 1972. He began his federal career with the Bureau of Reclamation in 1972 as an Environmental Specialist and Resource Planner, working in various other sectors leading him to apply for, and was selected as, the first Refuge Biologist on the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge. For ten years, he worked many projects until in 1992 he wrote them all out in his document, “The First Ten Years: A brief history of the biological program on the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge,” in June of 1992, a first-hand written account of his time there. He was then transferred to Atlanta, and then to Portland as an Ascertainment Biologist where he retired out of the Portland office.
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NORMAN: Hello, my name is Norman Olson. I’m a retired U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employee and a volunteer at the Service’s National Conservation Training Center (NCTC) in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. Today is Friday the 16th of September 2005, it’s approximately 1:00 in the afternoon and this interview is being conducted at the Red Lion Hotel on the River in Portland, Oregon. We’re here for a meeting of the reunion of the Association of Retired Fish and Wildlife Service Employees. This afternoon I’m going to interview Scott McLean, who is also a retired Fish and Wildlife Service employee. Scott, would you please begin by giving us your full name and spelling it for us; telling us when and where you were born and raised; where you went to college and the degrees you received; and then how you got started with your career in the Fish and Wildlife Service.
SCOTT: Okay. My name is L. Scott McLean, L S c o t t M c L e a n. The first name is Larry but I usually don’t respond well to that name. I was born and raised in Colorado Springs, Colorado... I was raised by my grandparents who died in 1958. I lived with my aunt and uncle in San Antonio, Texas and graduated from high school there in 1961. After graduation, I joined the Air Force. I left the service in 1965 and went to work in the public sector for about a year and a half. I then left to attend the University of Idaho receiving a Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in wildlife management and graduated in 1972. I began my federal career with the Bureau of Reclamation in 1972 as an Environmental Specialist and Resource Planner. After about 4 years, I left Reclamation and went to work for the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) as a Resource Area Biologist in Soda Springs, Idaho. After a year and a half, I transferred to Fairbanks, Alaska, as the 3
District Biologist. After two years, I left BLM in 1980 to work with the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) in Fairbanks as a field biologist for the Northwest Gas Pipeline project. I primarily dealt with permit review and providing recommendations on facility site locations and right-of-ways for the proposed gas pipeline from Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, into Canada. Early in1982, I applied for and was selected as the first Refuge Biologist on the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge (Flats, NWR, Refuge). Red Sheldon was the first Refuge Manager. At that particular point in time, I knew the Refuge staff which comprised of Lou Swenson, the Assistant Refuge Manager, and Roger Kaye, the Recreation Specialist. There was an ongoing conflict between the staff and Red which had elevated to the Regional Office. The staff was trying to get rid of Red because they felt he was a poor manager. When I was hired on, I was interviewed by the Regional Office staff and asked how I felt about the situation. I told them that as far as I was concerned, I was neutral on the conflict and I wasn’t going to make any waves one way or the other. I knew when I started that I was in a rocky situation.
I guess the first thing I probably ought to do is go back to when I began working with Fish and Wildlife Service personnel. When I was with the Bureau of Reclamation, I coordinated most of the projects I worked on with FWS personnel staff who were then called the Bureau of Sports Fisheries and Wildlife, River Basin Studies. I was always impressed with the caliber of those people. I thought the FWS employees were exceptionally professional and very dedicated in their work. As the District Biologist with BLM in Fairbanks, I was the Endangered Species Coordinator working closely with my counterpart in the FWS.
Getting back to the “Red era,” the first time I met Red was when I was working 4
with the FWS on the gas pipeline project. For the first half a year after I started working on the Refuge, I was probably the only staff person that Red talked to because I was supposed to be neutral and he thought I was more of an ally than I was an adversary. Red was very autocratic, dictatorial... we called him an alpha male... everything had to be done Red’s way. There was no exception. He was always very controlling of whom you talked to, who you saw, and where and what you did. An interesting incident happened when I came back from leave to attend a moose conference in Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada, which began in July. Before I left, Red alluded to the possibility of doing a duck banding project but he didn’t say anything or direct me to prepare for a banding effort. So I went to the conference and as soon as I got back he said, “Well, I want you to plan on a duck banding effort on Canvasback Lake.” This was like the end of July which I felt was a little late to be planning duck banding efforts. However, he wanted one so I ended up preparing to do it. We ended up calling this the “Great Canvasback Lake Duck Caper.” Red hired a couple of Natives from Birch Creek and had them flown in to the cabin on Canvasback Lake. I had never done a duck banding effort in my career and I didn’t have much time to prepare, so I just kind of winged it for the most part. I did look at some of the earlier banding work on the Flats that had been done by Cal Lensink and Jim King in the 1950's and 60's. I decided the best thing to do was follow their example and see what happened. So that’s what we did. We used net traps and after they were set up we would get in our inflatable Zodiacs (we had 2 with small outboard engines) and attempt to “herd” rafts of ducks toward the traps. Lou and I were in one of the Zodiacs and Red and one of the local Natives was in the other. The whole effort was to slowly coax a large group of ducks (a raft) moving toward the trap area. The duck species were mostly if not all scaup which was going to be a problem as they are divers. I think Red 5
was wanting to band dabblers (mallards, pintails, etc. which were already flying at this time... about a month and a half too late). That is why I thought it was a poor idea to do banding at this time. At any rate, we were going to catch a lot of scaup... or so we thought. So Lou and I had hundreds of these ducks at the end of the lake and were gently coaxing them down along the side of the lake toward the trap. Red was off in his Zodiac acting like a “cowboy” trying to “round up” small groups and even individual ducks by circling and trying to push them over toward the larger group moving down the other side of the lake. He would have maybe a half dozen ducks in a small group that he would attempt to “push” by going back and forth, revving his engine. It was funnier than hell. By the time he got them close to shore or anything, the ducks would dive and pop up in scattered locations. Red would go back around and do all of this stuff over again. Lou and I just shook our heads. Anyway, Lou and I ended up pushing this big raft of ducks over to the trap. Just before were got near the trap, the ducks began to dive and like Red, came popping up in scattered bunches all over the lake. We actually trapped about a dozen. Those inside the trap dove down to the bottom of the net and worked their way underneath. When we finally got to the trap to close it, we didn’t have a duck (laughter). Red was optimistic so we made another effort the next day... same effort, same shenanigans by Red, with the same results. The only duck we actually caught (which we didn’t really catch but rather found) was an old rubber duck decoy (laughter). So that was the great “Canvasback Lake Duck Caper.” It was a big fiasco... six refuge personnel, Roger Kaye, Red, Lou, myself, and the
two local Natives from Birch Creek; the cost of flying personnel and equipment from Fairbanks and Birch Creek using a twin engine amphibious Widgeon. When we were flown into the camp we didn’t have enough fuel for the outboard engines so the aircraft had to fly out to one of the villages, buy some, and return with it. It 6
was a tremendous waste of time and resources, but that was something Red wanted to do so that’s what we did.
That was my first aircraft incident where I later swore I’d never do again. When we were packing up and leaving, I was sitting in the back of the airplane. Then everybody started loading stuff on top of me because we needed to get nets, poles, camping gear and anything else they could load in. Lou sat in front and Red sat in the co-pilot seat. When the aircraft took off down the lake trying to get up on step, the rear end of that aircraft went down under the water... there was a little port hole where I was sitting and could look out... I was looking through water as it rushed by (laughter)... we didn’t get off that first try. When we got down to the other end of the lake, the pilot turned the aircraft around and started to take off back the way we came. The aircraft finally got up on step and finally lifted off the water to about 150 feet in the air when we passed over the cabin... trees grew to 60-80 feet. If we ever had a problem and had to ditch in the lake and gone down, I would never have gotten out of that airplane. I was stuck just where I was with all of this stuff on top of me. Anyway, that was the refuge’s first big project fiasco while I was on board. After that we started our planning efforts, which... well, you were involved in.
NORMAN: So this would have happened in the summer of ‘82 then probably, right?
SCOTT: The summer of ‘82.
NORMAN: Yeah, because we... I think we started our scoping meetings in 7
October of ‘82 that fall... that winter.
SCOTT: Yeah, and of course Red had a different philosophy on how to deal with Native interest. He tried to present a fatherly figure in dealing with “his children.” He was really conscientious of the Natives and felt they should be involved... although following his lead. Anything that happened on the Flats was his domain, even the Natives who lived there... on their own land. He felt that all the Natives who lived within the Refuge boundary were under his “umbrella” of responsibility. Our first big public involvement effort was the Fort Yukon meeting, which didn’t go too badly, mainly because we had a place to stay at the refuge cabin and didn’t have to interact with the locals all the time we were there so it wasn’t a big issue. However, the next stop was in the village of Beaver where we stayed with the constable... Leo... I can’t remember his last name.
NORMAN: Leo Edwards.
SCOTT: Leo Edwards. We stayed with Leo Edwards because he was the village constable. He had a small one-room cabin and lived with his son.
NORMAN: Yeah, he was... he was the VSPO... the Village... VPSO... the Village Public Safety Officer, I think, was his official title.
SCOTT: Yeah, okay. Let’s see, we got into Beaver in the afternoon and we had a meeting that night. I can’t remember much about the meetings, but I can remember all the other events. (Laughter)
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NORMAN: The good parts.
SCOTT: All the good parts. The first day I don’t think we really had much of a problem. Everything seemed to go fairly well... it wasn’t that big of a deal. Leo put us up in his cabin for the two nights we were there. Red wasn’t there. You, Lou, Mike Evens and I were present. The first night I think was pretty uneventful, not much happened. We had one meeting the first day but I can’t remember whether we had a meeting the next day or not.
NORMAN: No, I think we were in the village two nights and basically one night was a meeting and then we just... a day where we spent, you know, around the village and we just spent the second night... that would be the schedule where we were like two nights in each village.
SCOTT: Anyway, we stayed with Leo and he fed us and we slept in his cabin. As I say, it was just a one-room cabin. It had a bed that Leo and his son slept in and it had a couch. One of us slept on the couch and the other three slept on the floor. I guess I got lucky the second night and got the couch. After dinner the second night, there was a knock on the door and the village “chief” came in. He had been to Fairbanks and had bought a bottle of booze for Leo. Of course, Leo tried to hide the bottle and put it up in one of his kitchen cupboards. We all looked at each other but didn’t think too much of it after he put it away. It was about 10 o’clock when we were all getting ready for bed and Leo decided that he was going out. So he went over to the cupboard and grabs his bottle and heads out the door. I thought “Oh boy, hopefully if he drinks it all, he’ll pass out somewhere.” He didn’t show up until around midnight. We were all in bed when he came back in. 9
He was mumbling and was pretty much out of it. He just sat and kind of talked “at” us, like, “... why are you here and why were you doing all this stuff to our hunting grounds...” and whatever. He was just mumbling and maybe a half an hour or hour passed. I know we were all awake, but nobody said anything. We all pretended to sleep. It must have been about one or one thirty and someone began banging on the door. Leo got up and opened the door and the “chief” walks in and starts yelling toward us saying derogatory things about us. Leo kind of stuck up for us and told the “chief” to get out; that we were his guests. Then they started to push each other with Leo finally pushing the “chief” out the door. Having lived in Alaska for a few years and knowing what kind of things happen in villages where alcohol is involved, I was worried that the “chief” was going to come back with a gun, bust through the door and start shooting at the first one he could see laying around... which was me on the couch! (Laughter) Fortunately the “chief” never came back, but we all laid around and worried all night because after Leo pushed the “chief” out the door, he sat by his wood stove and kept throwing wood in and then sat and mumbled some more. All I could think about was that he’d open up the stove door and burning wood come rolling out and set the place on fire. Unfortunatel, the wood stove was near the entrance and all of us were packed in toward the sides and back of the cabin. Leo finally went to bed around five o’clock in the morning and you could almost hear this silent sigh of relief from everybody in the room. (Laughter) His kid had to get up for school and it was about seven o’clock. Leo had been in bed for only a couple of hours when the alarm went off. I thought, “Jeez, he’s going to get up and be really hung over...” actually he acted pretty normal. We managed to get through the night.
I was looking forward to the next day because Roger Kaye came in to replace me. I was going home to Fairbanks via Fort Yukon after we flew to Stevens Village 10
where the planning team would stay for a day or two. We had heard that Stevens Village was having or just had a Potlatch, usually when someone died. Just as the aircraft was touching down on the runway, Natives came zooming by on snow machines and chased the airplane down the runway. The Natives were hooting and hollering. When we were deplaning, all of these inebriated Natives came up to the aircraft. You, Mike, Lou and Roger got all your gear and trooped away in this tight little formation to one of the villager’s house. That left the pilot and me alone with all of these inebriated Natives. They thought we were the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) and they were, you know, being pretty derogatory about Fish and Game and what they thought we were doing, such as killing all their moose so they didn’t have any meat on the table. I just wanted to get out of there and ended up taking three of them to Fort Yukon. There’s a little more to that story, but I won’t mention it. (Laughter) Our village visits were interesting but it’s hard to remember what happened as far as the actual effect of the meetings was concerned....
NORMAN: It was... it was the least of our concerns. (Laughter) That was interesting because it was my exposure... see I had just come from working in Kenai on the Kenai plan, which was a totally different sort of situation... environment... and so this was my introduction to the Interior of Alaska. I remember actually, the meeting we had when Red was there in Fort Yukon, there was one drunken Native that stood up in the back of the room, kept on standing up and making these long speeches...you couldn’t understand what he was talking about. Mike Evens had always counseled me if anything happens, you know, don’t do anything, let them take care of it, just let things ride. So we just sat there through all of that and he kept on standing and finally I remember the Natives that 11
were sitting next to him kept on saying, “Sit down,” and pulled him down and finally they led him out of the room and it took care of itself. So that was the first experience and then the experience in Beaver was interesting. I can remember that morning we got up; Leo was chipper and talking to us like nothing had happened. He made breakfast and all of us were just sort of sitting there, you know, not talking (laughter) waiting to get out of there... we were glad to get out of there. But Leo was like back to normal, it was like nothing had ever happened. And then the Beaver experience... or the Stevens Village experience... seeing when we landed, all those drunk guys, it was just like, oh no. That was... that was an interesting introduction to Native villages and Native life for me.
SCOTT: And then you had to go to two more villages.
NORMAN: Yeah.
SCOTT: Birch Creek and then...
NORMAN: Chalkyitsik.
SCOTT: Oh, three...
NORMAN: Yeah, there were three more actually.
SCOTT: Because then you had to go to Circle.
NORMAN: Yeah, oh yeah, that’s right. 12
SCOTT: Circle’s the one where Red got up and took his uniform shirt off and turned it inside out and said “Now you can talk to me. I’m not the refuge manager anymore. You can’t see the patch so, you know, I’m just anybody... so you can say what you want to say.”
NORMAN: The other thing... I can verify the fact... your description of Red because I know when we started working on the Yukon Flats plan and our first meetings with Red, I remember him pulling me aside and saying “Look,” he said, “I know what needs to be said in the plan, but I need you guys to say it for me, so that’s what you’re here for. You’re to write the plan for me and I know what it needs to say.” And we started talking; well, we’ve got to have all this public involvement... “No, I know what needs to go in the plan. You guys write it for me, I’ll tell you what to put in it.” So right from there... from that point on, we were in trouble with Red. (Laughter)
SCOTT: Anyway, after the initial planning effort in the villages, Red started to understand that the staff was really reluctant to work with him and that included me. For the next half a year, starting in January ‘83, we saw less and less of Red and he was basically doing everything on his own. I mean he was doing all the staff work and everything. Fortunatel
Scott & Vera Olson, Clara Wieden, Lillie Peterson & Ethel Wilson
No full textScott & Vera Olson, Clara Wieden, Lillie Peterson & Ethel Wilsonhttps://digitalmaine.com/stockholm_images/1783/thumbnail.jp
Scott & Vera Olson, Clara Wieden, Lillie Peterson & Ethel Wilson
No full textScott & Vera Olson, Clara Wieden, Lillie Peterson & Ethel Wilsonhttps://digitalmaine.com/stockholm_images/1783/thumbnail.jp
Invitation: Presidential Inauguration of Dr. Scott Olson
No full textThis document is the invitation to Dr. Scott Olson\u27s Presidential Inauguration as the 15th president of Winona State University on April 19, 2013. The invitation file includes the documents included in the invitation, accommodations, directions, guest response card, delegate response card, schedule of events, program, special thanks, and envelope.https://openriver.winona.edu/presidentsdocuments/1005/thumbnail.jp
What Digital Technology Means (And Doesn’t Mean) for Learning
No full textIn the spring of 2012 Winona State University (WSU) President Dr. Scott Olson shared his remarks in an Athenaeum presentation titled What Digital Technology Means (And Doesn’t Mean) for Learning. Dr. Olson was WSU\u27s President from 2012-2023.
Dr. Deanne Mohr*, WSU Music Department Faculty, performed as an introduction to Dr. Olson\u27s presentation. This presentation occurred in the Library Athenaeum on the second floor of the Darrell W. Krueger Library.https://openriver.winona.edu/athenaeum/1051/thumbnail.jp
Save the Date: Presidential Inauguration of Dr. Scott Olson
No full textThis document is a Save the Date card for Dr. Scott Olson\u27s presidential inaugurationas the 15th president of Winona State University. The presidential inauguration was on Friday, April 19, 2013.https://openriver.winona.edu/presidentsdocuments/1004/thumbnail.jp
Donor Acknowledgement Flyer: Presidential Inauguration of Dr. Scott Olson
No full textThis document is a flyer, included in a gift bag, to communicate the special thanks to the community members which contributed to the Dr. Scott Olson\u27s presidential inauguration. Document is dated April 19, 2013.https://openriver.winona.edu/presidentsdocuments/1003/thumbnail.jp
Spring 2020 Virtual Celebration: President Scott Olson Speech
No full textWSU President Scott Olson shares his remarks and congratulations to the WSU class of 2020. This video is an excerpt from the Spring 2020 Commencement video.https://openriver.winona.edu/wsucommencement2020videos/1003/thumbnail.jp
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