With a cheerful smile, Richard P. Veler ’58, professor of English and general secretary of the university, sits in his Recitation Hall office for the last time.

The desk where he strategized about Wittenberg’s future and where he prepared numerous proposals for institutional policies lies bare. The antique shelves that once contained a collection of books now stand empty, and the room echoes slightly.

The scene tells the story: Veler is saying goodbye. “Recent tests related to my bypass surgery last fall suggest the wisdom of my slowing down a bit, so I shall officially retire Sept. 1,” Veler wrote in a letter to the campus community this summer.

A letter in everyone’s personal box — Veler wouldn’t have announced it any other way.

For 35 years, he has added his own personal touch to everything at Wittenberg, a place he is proud to call his alma mater and a place he has been proud to serve as both a professor and an administrator for more than three decades.

“It’s been a treat and an honor to travel the country representing Wittenberg,” Veler said. “The ethos of this place has stayed the same, and it’s one that has made me comfortable and one that I have believed in throughout the years.”

It was that ethos that drew him to Wittenberg as a student in the ’50s and that called him back as a professor in 1965. “The chair for my dissertation at OSU told me, ‘go where you’ll be happiest because it’s there that you’ll do your best work,’” Veler said.

He listened, and he still shares that advice with students. Catherine Beebe ’96, who worked with Veler on the Wittenberg Today, is just one of the thousands of students whose lives Veler has helped to shape.

“I’ll always be grateful to Dr. Veler,” Beebe said. “He took a chance on a recent graduate whom he didn’t know at all and gave me my first full-time job,” she said.

“I’ve been impressed by the level and length of commitment Dr. Veler has shown to Wittenberg, and I would really like to find an organization or a movement that I believe in and to which I can make the same sort of commitment.”

Veler has also learned an enormous amount from the students who have taken his American novel, American survey and Mark Twain classes, among others.

“I’ve been amazed at the way they’ve been able to communicate the power of literature to their peers,” he said.

A firm believer in literary critic Benjamin DeMott’s conviction that literature gives people significant resources for living, Veler has tried to put “flesh and blood” on literature throughout his tenure. “There are so many life lessons there,” he said.

His wife of 24 years, Suzanne, shares his enthusiasm, and together they have regularly entertained classes at breakfast or brunch to talk about literature and life.

Veler has also accompanied students to England to tour literary sites and to study at the University of Exeter. “The experience made the literature live,” he said. Such experiences illustrate the imagination, creativity and resourcefulness that Veler has seen daily in Wittenberg students.

“Every day is different,” he said, “and it’s been a day-to-day pleasure.” The same can be said for his administrative career at Wittenberg, which has included serving as an associate dean of the college, chair of the English department, university editor and as the general secretary of the university.

“I’ve been blessed to have had a variety of incarnations at Wittenberg with the teaching as a continuity,” he said.

“Both President Bill Kinnison and President Baird Tipson gave me substantial responsibilities/opportunities that enlivened my life at Wittenberg.

I am singularly grateful that — particularly for the last five years of my career here — I could work with Baird on policies and procedures and could engage with faculty, administrators, staff and board members in planning Wittenberg’s future.”

“I cannot replace Dick because much of his effectiveness depended upon his long experience as a professor of English, as university editor, and as what always appeared to me as the conscience of Wittenberg,” President Tipson said.

“The title of general secretary of the university will retire along with him.” Yet, it’s hearing from former students who now lead productive, responsible and rewarding lives that makes Veler most proud.

Throughout the years, many have stopped by his Springfield home to share a concern or just to say hello. Others have written or called. To Veler, these are the moments that defined his time at Wittenberg. “They validate what my career was all about.”