* * Bud and Stuart and my Civil War quest

James I. Robertson, Jr., or “Bud” to his countless friends, has died.

Bud held the C. P. “Sally” Miles Professorship at Virginia Tech from 1976 until his appointment in 1992 as Alumni Distinguished Professor, which he held until retirement in 2011, during which time he taught in the History Department, specializing in the Civil War.

My relationship with Bud began in the early 1970s when I took his Civil War course, a diversion from my Mechanical Engineering courses. He was a rock star even then, teaching to a packed 300 seat auditorium. He made a war that had been over for 100 years relevant and fascinating to 20 year old college students. Every lecture had a “and you were there!” theatric quality to it.

Bud's Civil War was not about battles and troop movements and strategy. His was about the soldiers, the wives and girlfriends back home, the medicine and prisons and food and songs, the toil and fear and horror and death. Bud’s subjects were living an unprecedented tragedy in our nation’s most terrible time, and many of them were the same age or younger than the students in his class.

When I got the idea in 2008 to write my first book, The Spine of the Virginias, about the odd sibling relationship between Virginia and West Virginia, knowing that the latter had split from the former in the Civil War, I went to see Bud. “Come by my office during my regular office hours. I still consider you a student,” he invited.

He said he was not knowledgeable about the West Virginia foundation story, but his friend Stuart McGehee in Bluefield was, and he encouraged me to contact Stuart, who was an associate professor of history at Bluefield College and then at West Virginia State University in Institute. McGehee also was the longtime director of the Eastern Regional Coal Archives at the public library in Bluefield.

I asked Bud, "If I can get an interview with him, will you go with me?" and he said yes.

So I picked up Bud at his home in a north Blacksburg neighborhood and off to Bluefield we went. I have to tell you that Bud was a bit of a control freak. He INSISTED that we leave 2 hours early to meet Stuart. I had just done the drive a week earlier and knew it took 75 minutes. But Bud wouldn't have it. So we arrived 45 minutes early and walked the downtown of Bluefield while we waited to appear on time.

When we met Stuart, he and Bud chatted about family and friends and old times. Then Stuart looked at me and said purposefully, “Now what can I do for you?”

Bud replied instead, “Michael is thinking about a book about the border communities between Virginia and West Virginia and wants to know about the split,” or something like that.

For the next 90 minutes, Stuart took over and explained the foundation story, from his often contrary and somewhat controversial perspective. Bud and I sat transfixed. It was a lifetime memorable moment, as Professor McGehee was every bit the equal as a storyteller as Professor Robertson.

I shortly realized I was in the presence of two geniuses; it was the easiest, most informative interview I'd ever done. Stuart’s knowledge and Bud's encouragement helped me decide that I could really write my book. Seven more have followed.

On our way home, Bud and I were talking about the state of America's politics. Now mind you, this was 12 years ago. As a lifelong scholar of the American experience, he said, “People today think our democracy can withstand any threat. It can't. We'd be wise to start thinking about ourselves as countrymen and less as political rivals.”

We did quick calculations in our heads and figured during his 5 decades at Tech, he had taught over 20,000 students. When he was forced by a broken leg to take a semester off and a replacement was brought in to teach for him, half those enrolled dropped it.

I still remember some of those lectures, his mellifluous voice, his mild speech impediment, and his unmistakable Southside Virginia accent. Even Hokies who didn’t take his class knew of him, one of Tech's truly larger than life individuals, and arguably its most decorated and beloved educator.

After retirement, Bud moved to Virginia's Northern Neck, and we were only in sporadic contact. But his influence on my life is inestimable, and I will always appreciate it.

Stuart McGehee was my age, and he took his own life a couple of years later, after learning he had pancreatic cancer. And now Bud is gone as well. As the Civil War has faded into the past, so have these two giants of history education faded into the ether, held alive by the memories of the students they enlightened, motivated, and enthralled.