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Sadie Jo Black Ensures the Show Goes On . . . AirBy Judy Prather
For more than three decades, Sadie Jo Black taught Baylor students how
to manage their resources. Now, in her retirement years, the former
home economics professor is serving as a model for how to be generous
with those resources.
Over the past few years, Black has established endowed scholarships in
memory of every member of her family. She also provided a scholarship
for a chemistry major interested in doing cancer research and funded a
companion lecture series in the Department of Chemistry, the W. Dial
Black Family Lecture Series.
 In
2005, she established yet another endowed fund, this time to ensure a
beautiful garden in Founders Mall. The first year, the Sadie Jo Black
Gardens included twenty-six thousand annual flowers, as well as
perennial plants and shrubs and benches to sit on and enjoy the view.
Black is personally involved in decisions about landscaping for the
garden, as those in charge continue to make the garden beautiful year
after year. "Of course, this is Texas," she says. "It's always a game
with the weather."
Now, Black is pulling out the checkbook again, and this time it's
Homecoming she wants to help. "I was so disappointed when they didn't
televise the Homecoming parade last year, I thought surely there was a
mistake," she says. "When I learned it was because of the expense
involved, I thought, 'Well, if that's the only problem, maybe I can
help.'"
Black's love affair with all things Baylor goes back to childhood. She
grew up in Teague, and her parents frequently brought her and her
brother to the Baylor campus for concerts and other events. "They
strongly believed in education," she says, "and chose both of our
careers. They decided Dub was to be a banker, and I was to teach home
economics."
Happily, her parents were wise as well as loving, and the choices fit
their children well. Her brother, Dub, became a successful banker, and
Sadie had an equally productive career as a home economics teacher. She
earned her degree in the subject from Baylor in 1950 and the MEd degree
from Colorado State University. She later did postgraduate work at both
Southern Methodist University and Texas Woman's University.
In 1957, she joined the Baylor faculty and went on to teach home
economics for the next thirty-five years, until her retirement in 1992.
(The department is now called Family and Consumer Sciences, but that
nationwide change occurred two years after she retired.) Black says
that during her time on the faculty she taught "almost everything."
Some of her favorite courses included interior design for non-majors
and resource management (how to budget money and time). She also taught
meal management--with Lyndon Olson Jr., former U.S. ambassador to
Sweden and BAA Sesquicentennial Campaign chair, as one of her students.
But perhaps the most memorable of the courses she taught was home
management. A required course for senior majors, it involved her
actually living with the students--six at a time--something she did for
nine years. "And, oh," she exclaims, "the stories I could tell!"
Throughout her Baylor experience--as a child, a student, and a
professor--she has always enjoyed Homecoming. "The best part is seeing
so many good friends and ex-students," she comments, "all the
festivities and bonding. Homecoming is the definition of the Baylor
family."
She also thinks it's important to provide this slice of Baylor life to
the entire Waco community. "I believe in the impact that Baylor has on
the community," she says, "but I also know all the community does for
Baylor. People need to enjoy Homecoming, the parade as much as the
game." She believes televising the parade also ensures that enjoyment
for the disabled or those who prefer to watch from home.
Black chose to give her money to the Baylor Alumni Association this
time. With her initial gift to begin a Homecoming endowment fund, she
is helping the association facilitate the televising of the parade. But
her gift actually serves two purposes: it provides current-use dollars
to ensure this year's parade will be shown, and it provides the
security of future-use dollars for parades to come.
"As a member of the association, I support activities of alumni," Black
says. "And I believe the old saying, 'A friend in need is a friend
indeed.' So I thought I could help support the alumni association and
provide this entertainment for the community at the same time."
Like Black, other alumni and friends can contribute to the ongoing
strength of Homecoming by making a gift to the Homecoming endowment
fund of the Sesquicentennial Campaign.
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