John Paul Willson has been a teacher for 48 years, most of them at Hillsdale College. He retired in 2005 (after around 12,500 students, 78,000 papers and exams, and 4000 meetings) but can't seem to get retirement right. He has been the second oldest in a five-generation picture. He still coaches punters and placekickers and plays a lot of golf. One wife, Helen; three daughters and ten grandchildren. Happy Catholic.
John Willson
Articles by John Willson
Why I am a Conservative
If you love place, limits, liberty, and think they are words that have meaning, you are probably conservative, and should honor that word also.
Generations
I sense a gap on FPR between NoNamers and most of the rest.
Our Lost Founders
We should have been courageous, he said; we will have to face the consequences of our lack of courage, he said.
Schlubs of the World, Unite!
I've been reading Bill Kauffman's immensely entertaining, and very serious, Forgotten Founder, Drunken Prophet: The Life of Luther Martin. This is Bill's attempt to get us antifederalists back into the…
The Next Time You’re in New Hampshire
Now that GM stands for “Government Motors” who can love a Chevy? In many ways, seat belt laws paved the way for this transformation. Government straps me in, government keeps…
On the Road Again
. . . we rediscovered the meaning of Place. Limits. Liberty.
Ideal Curriculum
This term gets used too much. Whenever you are exiled to a curriculum committee run as fast as if you were asked to serve on a tax-cutting committee run by…
Louis Auchincloss, RIP
Louis Auchincloss died January 26, 2010, aged 92. Most of the obits talk about his prolific writing career while working as a serious attorney until age 87. They also emphasize…
Tiger, Tiger
But what would bring Tiger back? Does anybody think he would go to confession? I mean, heck, Bill Clinton still thinks he has the moral upper hand on Ken Starr.
Friendship with New England Reserve
As the half-savage neighbor in Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall” says, “Good fences make good neighbors.”
Be My Valentine
Of all the Valentine legends I've heard, my favorite is the one that martyred St. Valentine because he secretly married Roman soldiers against the order of the Emperor Claudius. It…
Newburgh and “President’s Day”
We have a Constitution and separation of powers and at least the idea of limited government because of the character of George Washington. Don’t think of Monday as “President’s Day.”
The Heart of Light and the Heart of Darkness
He is resigned to the inertia of the old Spanish cult, and willing to just let it fade away. The voluptuousness of European culture had no way to gain traction…
It’s the Family, Stupid
Hillsdale,MI. David the King ordered the beautiful Bathsheba to come to him because he could. He also could have her husband killed, and sent the letter that condemned Uriah the…
Fifty Dollar Tomato
Hillsdale, MI. When I first thought about writing this it was the “Ten Dollar Tomato.” But historians are more or less required to tell the truth, and it now costs…
Sewers and Leashes: A Local Story
Hillsdale, MI. This is a true story. It happened once upon a time in a place I do not now live. After an arduous campaign I was elected to the…
Iron Mountain
Hillsdale, MI. Today the folks at NPR are having a grand old time remembering the Fall of the Wall. German rockers, Hungarian revolutionaries, Romanian artists--many stories of suffering and heroism,…
What’s Local?
Hillsdale, MI. A Mormon friend of mine once argued that the LDS prohibition of alcohol was right and proper not only because it was revealed, but because he had tried…
The Booth Tarkington Appreciation Society
Hillsdale, MI. I propose the creation of TBTAS, “The Booth Tarkington Appreciation Society.” If we take the liberties some have with the Tetragrammaton (Y*H*W*H) and pronounce it “yahway,” we could…
The American Aesop
Hillsdale, MI. It is said that Aesop, despite making all his characters animals and thus avoiding being Nathan to his contemporary Davids, was finally thrown over a cliff by the…
Crolier Than Thou
Almost lost among the bicentennial celebrations of Lincoln’s and Darwin’s births is the centenary of Herbert Croly’s The Promise of American Life, a child of theirs and one of the…
The Right Way to Kick a Football
My father played for the Philadelphia Eagles. He didn’t particularly want to: In 1933, 1934, and 1935 the Eagles were a new “franchise” in the National Football League and not…