A HISTORY OF THE DEPARTMENT OF GEOGRAPHY AND ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES AT PITT-JOHNSTOWN
THE EARLY YEARS
Geography at Pitt-Johnstown had its beginning in 1970. At that point, UPJ had no geography department, although there were three geography faculty, all recruited via the grad student “pipeline” at the University of Pittsburgh. At that time, it was common practice for Pitt’s regional campuses to recruit junior faculty directly from advanced graduate student ranks in Oakland. The three geographers were Mary Lavine, Earl Mueller, and Howard Nizinski.
Positions were created by enrollment growth at the newly built Richland Township campus. Demand for general education courses in geography grew to the point where the geography faculty were soon offered full-time rather than part-time positions. Geography’s enrollment owed a great deal to the Pennsylvania Department of Education, which required education majors to complete the equivalent of Earth and People (then called “Earth and Man”) and Geography of the United States. The geography faculty worked alongside other social scientists in the newly formed Social Science Division, initially led by history professor Dr. Robert Hunter.
In 1971-1972, significant personnel changes occurred. At the departmental level, Earl Mueller departed and was replaced by Bill Kory, with interests in Africa and demography, and like Howard Nizinski and Mary Lavine, still an ABD. A new President and Academic Dean immediately set out to raise Pitt-Johnstown’s ambitions and expectations regarding faculty, curriculum, and enrollment. Over the next years, the geography curriculum expanded reflecting the faculty’s interests and competencies. For example, Bill Kory’s experience as a Peace Corps volunteer in Liberia, as a and as a Russian speaker since birth, all informed his educational mission. He started a Geography of Africa and a Geography of Soviet Union (later Geography of Russia) course. Bill’s also had an interest in politics, inside and outside the classroom, so he taught Political Geography while also being a borough councilman for over 20 years. As a result, when UPJ soon transitioned from a two-year “feeder” institution to one with four-year degree programs, we were able to offer a “concentration” in geography within a broad Social Science degree.
THE GROWTH YEARS
By the late-1970s, Bill Kory and Mary Lavine established a major in geography that mirrored the curriculum in established geography programs across the country. The real challenge for the new geography major came from Cartography. While the Department had the other courses mostly in place already—Urban Geography, Economic Geography, Population Geography, Physical Geography, and regional courses—neither Bill Kory nor Mary Lavine had any significant experience with map production. Nevertheless, together they set up a lab and improved their cartographic skills. Some equipment, such as drafting and light tables, came from Pitt-Oakland’s Geography Department which had just closed its doors. Bill and Mary team taught Cartography for a period of time. After that, the course remained Mary’s class until her retirement.
Computer-assisted mapping was introduced into the curriculum in 1986, dramatically changing forever how cartography was taught; manual cartography quickly became a single exercise rather than the focus of the course. In the 1990s, the Geography Department offered the first course in Geographic Information Systems. Because the Krebs Hall lab was so small, eventually classes were relocated, first to an Engineering lab and subsequently to Blackington Hall, enabling larger sections of Cartography and GIS while still maintaining a small lab for geography majors within the departmental complex. This area of teaching may have been (and continues to be) the most important contribution to our students’ career preparation.
One of the Department’s professional contributions has been our dedication to the Pennsylvania Geographical Society. For example, the Society’s meeting has been held in Johnstown several times, most recently in 2001, 2007, and 2022. Bill Kory, in particular, was an active member of the organization for much of his academic life. His “baby” was the society’s journal, The Pennsylvania Geographer, which he was instrumental in guiding to become a peer-reviewed journal. In 1990, Bill Kory took over the editorship, a position he held until 2022. In fact, the entire Pitt-Johnstown Geography Department has always been closely involved in the publication of the journal.
To truly be a full-fledged program, another need for the Department was to expand course offerings in physical geography. Howard Nizinski had left the department in the mid-70s and a succession of interim appointments followed, but the department was still without the desired depth in physical geography. It is in that context that Greg Faiers made his first appearance at Pitt-Johnstown in 1989. Greg was familiar with the geography program at Pitt-Johnstown as a faculty at Bowling Green State University. While teaching at its Master’s program, it became apparent that the students who came from Pitt-Johnstown were very well prepared for graduate school.
As is common, Bill Kory and Mary Lavine interviewed prospective hires at the AAG’s job fair (that year in Baltimore). Qualifications listed in the advertisement were “a generalist in physical geography with PhD in hand and some teaching experience.” Greg fit the bill. The interview in Baltimore went well, he was called into Pitt-Johnstown for an on-campus interview and was subsequently offered the job. With the addition of a physical geographer, the Department could now offer a more comprehensive Bachelor’s degree, including new courses such as Climatology, Water Resources, and Natural Hazards. Greg Faiers also took on the role as Associate Editor of The Pennsylvania Geographer.
To the Department’s dismay, taught at Pitt-Johnstown for three years before leaving for a research position in the newly established Southern Regional Climate Center at his alma mater Louisiana State University. He worked there for three years before moving back into an academic position at Longwood College in Virginia.
Physical geography limped along with short-term appointments for a few years after Greg’s departure. But in 1997, Greg got a phone call from Bill Kory announcing that his “old” position was open again. Given his good experiences at Pitt-Johnstown, Greg was eager to return to Johnstown (and Longwood only had a minor in Geography). This time he stuck around! Greg taught at Pitt-Johnstown until his retirement in 2016, always a valued colleague and friend.
Another aspect of the Department that emerged over the years is it student-centered approach. That has been manifested in many ways. We have sent over 200 students to graduate school throughout the country. Dozens of universities where students went graduate schools are highlighted on a customized map that we proudly display in the hallway.
Since the 1980s, we have made a home for students in the Geography Club (later the Geography and Environmental Studies Club). Activities include field trips, fund raises, dinners, and conference travels. The Department has had a long record of students travelling to, and presenting at, conferences such as the AAG and the PGS. The Department has for decades also hosted a week-long program of speakers, usually alumni who are in graduate school or hold professional jobs, for Geography Awareness Week every fall. By the 1990s. the Department established a Gamma Theta Upsilon (GTU) chapter. GTU is a geographic honor society for students. It fell on Greg Faiers to be the GTU coordinator. For the duration of his tenure, Greg organized student eligibility and the induction ceremonies, which have typically been held every second year since its inception.
THE COMING OF ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES
The Department’s next major foray into curriculum development occurred in the late 1990s, in the form of an Environmental Studies major. This was a time when many institutions were launching interdisciplinary environmental programs. The Geography Department, and especially Mary Lavine, therefore developed a program built on a strong base of environmental science (courses in physical geography and the natural sciences) paralleled by an equal dose of environmental policy courses, mostly in the social sciences. The inter-disciplinary program generated support beyond the department. Many faculty across campus were eager to participate. Anthropology, biology, chemistry, civil engineering, economics, English literature, geology, history, philosophy, political science, and sociology all contributed to the program, sometimes by creating brand-new courses. The program has since prepared students with the necessary policy and science background to succeed as professionals in agencies and organizations that shape or administer environmental policy.
One impetus for Mary Lavine to establish Environmental Studies was her early experience in coordinating a campus recycling program. In part from that experience, Mary later established the Resource Management class. A hallmark of Mary’s was the full-day bus excursion tour to environmental sites in the Johnstown areas for her class.
The division of labor to administer Environmental Studies was that Mary Lavine, as the Director of the program, was responsible for internships, curricular coordination, and advising. While Greg Faiers taught Introduction to Environmental Studies and Senior Seminar in Environmental Studies. All the geography faculty, in fact, offered courses to support the Environmental Studies major. By no accident, the new program complemented the existing geography major. The Department saw an increase in the number of students double majoring in Environmental Studies and Geography, which has been common ever since. In 2011, Mary Lavine retired and Greg Faiers assumed the role as Director of the Environmental Studies program.
THE DEPARTMENT IN THE 21st CENTURY
Back in 2000, the Department received university approval for a fourth geographer, largely thanks to the additional administrative and teaching responsibilities associated with the Environmental Studies program. John Maher (PhD Maryland) came onboard for a couple of years and took over the urban course sequence. His relatively quick departure opened the door for recruiting Ola Johansson in 2002. In addition to teaching Urban Development, he converted the upper-level urban class to Urban Planning. That was a needed development as urban planning is one of the subfields of geographer that provides ample employment opportunities. From his background at the Tennessee Valley Authority, he also added a course on energy issues as well as a new regional class, Geography of Europe. Over time, many of his courses have supported both geography and the policy section in the Environmental Studies curriculum. As was customary in the Department, Ola became involved with the Pennsylvania Geographical Society, eventually becoming the Society’s President, as well as the Associate Editor of the Pennsylvania Geographer. Tasks like reading manuscripts, communicating with contributors, and copyediting the journal were shared within the Department. A physical reminder of the journal’s association with the Department is the “Pennsylvania Geographer closet,” a small room in the back of Krebs 119 that is a repository for decades of physical copies of the journal. In 2022, Ola Johansson became the lead editor of the journal.
Perhaps it was success with the Environmental Studies major that emboldened geography to propose and then shepherd another ambitious environmentally-oriented undertaking: the Climate Change Forum. The Forum evolved as a well-attended one-day campus “happening” every year, and as a multidisciplinary effort engaging students and faculty from the social and natural science divisions, engineering, and humanities. It had a good five-year run from 2006-2011 under the guidance of Mary Lavine.
An important curriculum initiative for geography was the development of the 18 credit GIS Certificate at a time when many geography departments still didn’t offer such a concentration. The Certificate was the brainchild of Mary Lavine’s, although it was implemented the year after she retired. The hiring of Ahmad Massasati in 2011 as her replacement in GIS and cartography allowed the fledgling program to take off. In addition to the existing mapping courses, two new offerings—Remote Sensing and the capstone Special Project in GIS—were added to the Certificate and the Department’s course offerings in general. Ahmad also added depth to the Department by teaching Urban Development and the always-in-demand Earth and People. When not in the classroom, Ahmad is often spotted operating a drone together with students for class projects in the mapping courses.
At the time Ahmad Massasati joined the department and took on the role as coordinator of the GIS Certificate program, we were able to intertwine the Certificate program and geography’s environmental policy classes with Environmental Studies and a minor in Geography. In some instances, students graduate with a major in both Environmental Studies and Geography while also getting the GIS Certificate.
When Greg Faiers retired in 2017, Mitzy Schaney replaced him as the Environmental Studies Director. Mitzy came to us from the Geography and Geology Department at West Virginia University. She also brought valuable experience from the Federal agency sector; more specifically, the US Army Corps of Engineers. As a geomorphologist specializing in water and soil, she also brought a strong field research component to her teaching mission. (Greg Faiers specialized in extreme weather events and fortunately he did not bring our students in the field to study that.) Some of her field trip experiences during spring breaks and summers have included trips to Mojave Desert, coastal Virginia, and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. She also organized annual trips to soil judging competitions taking place in various places across the United States. As faculty member with equipment-driven research and teaching, Mitzy has also brough in significant grant funds to the Department. For example, she was instrumental in setting up a small lab in Krebs Hall that is geared towards analyzing microplastics in regional water bodies.
In 2021, an era at Pitt-Johnstown geography was coming to an end. Bill Kory decided to hang up his hat after 50 years at the institution. His plan was to ease into retirement, which he did for a year by teaching part-time and retaining an emeritus office on campus. But on April 2, 2022, we received the terrible news that he has passed away. You can learn more about his lifetime achievements here: https://www.aag.org/memorial/william-b-kory/ and https://www.ducafuneralhome.com/obituary/DrWilliam-Kory#tributewall. On a good note, the Department has had the pleasure of hiring the former students Matt Sernell and JT Bandzuh as adjunct professors to teach geography classes. Matt is now active with the Pitt-Johnstown Alumni Association and JT accepted a full-time position at Mount Aloysius College.
FINAL REFLECTIONS ON THE SPIRIT OF THE DEPARTMENT
The success of a department depends upon demand for what it has to offer. At first, the principal driver of demand was a state mandate requiring geography for education majors. Later, as majors were created across the Pitt-Johnstown campus, both college-wide requirements and division-level requirements for social science students helped sustain the demand for geography courses and kept the department visible. But beyond that, geography had to make itself attractive in order to be viable. The problem is that high school students receive little exposure to geography as a field of study, so virtually nobody comes to college with that major in mind.
Therefore, promoting geography is important through quality teaching and engagement with students. The Environmental Studies program also helped make geography more visible. The highest praise for promoting geography goes to Bill Kory in his role as long-time Department chairman and cheerleader. His extraordinary enthusiasm for geography, his relentless promotion of the discipline, and his devotion to students, from prospective majors to the graduate school-bound to long ago grads who keep in touch, surely earns him the title of “Mr. Geography” at Pitt-Johnstown.
The collegiality of the Department has always been second to none. We take pride in our warm, supportive, and caring environment where it is important to work well and cooperatively together, making the work environment a “home away from home.” The other faculty have been willing to cover for the teaching assignments of tenured professors on sabbatical leave, often in locations far away from Johnstown. The sabbaticals have mirrored the particular professional interests and/or historical affiliations of our faculty. For example, Mary Lavine’s sabbatical research included a technological hazards project at Clark University in Worcester, MA, and using GIS to map the distribution of victims of the 1889 Johnstown Flood. Bill Kory aided in the census of Liberia as well as a stint as a Fulbright Scholar in Egypt. Greg Faiers travelled to Louisiana to conduct climate research at LSU. And Ola Johansson has been a guest scholar at Linnaeus University in Sweden with a research emphasis on the Swedish music industry.
Many faculty arriving at Pitt-Johnstown expecting this to be just the “first gig” before moving on to something else, somewhere else. This has also been true for the geography faculty, many of whom never anticipated spending entire careers in Krebs Hall, but that’s what happened. Here we should particularly acknowledge Bill Kory (50 years at Pitt-Johnstown), Mary Lavine (41 years), and Greg Faiers (24 years). In the end, the final shout out should go to our students. They have contributed immensely to the quality of the Department and will continue to do so in the future.
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