Norris E. Class,

As We Remember Him

For those licensors, and others, who never knew Norris Class, here are some personal glimpses shared because his friends treasure his personality as well as his remarkable contributions to our field. We believe we best honor his memory and his friendship by building on the excellence he demanded of our profession, and of each one of us.

We knew him as Norrie. He was of slight build, topping five feet by only a few inches. He looked so frail, even though his health was good, that his parents didn't allow him to take a part-time job in college.

His towering, aggressive intellect was housed under a shock of white hair kept in a Buster Brown cut that few of his age would have dared. He adopted the style when he thought he was going bald, although he never did. He also wore a navy wool tam most of the year.

Norrie traveled widely in his work but refused to fly unless there was no realistic alternative. He simply didn't trust airplanes. He also preferred trains and buses because these gave him more time to take extensive social histories on his seat-mates. As a consequence of his attitude about planes, his acceptance of invitations for speaking and consultation engagements was influenced by the location of train stations.

One of Norrie's favorite places was New Orleans where he gave summer licensing seminars at Tulane for 20 years. He loved the city's jazz and its old hotels and fine restaurants in the French Quarter. His choice of restaurants was impeccable but sorely challenged his entourage of impecunious state employees on limited per diems.

One favorite Norrie-story, contributed by David Beard (TX), concerned their encounter with a headwaiter at the Brown Palace in Denver. David was suitably attired. Norrie was wearing one of his trade mark collarless shirts that looked rather like the top of a union suit. (A man willing to wear a Buster Brown haircut and a tam will do anything.) The hotel's rule was: No tie, no dinner. The headwaiter relented only so far as to lend Norrie a tie that looked ridiculous on a collarless shirt. Norrie was unfazed, of course. He always was.

Norrie's keen taste, one that enabled him to identify every ingredient in a dish, and his love of good food eventually led him to enroll in a cooking school in his seventies. He enjoyed displaying his new culinary skills in his Topeka home. Norrie would turn out magnificent meals. His wife, Lori, who did the clean-ups, laughingly complained, however, that it looked as though one of those infamous Kansas tornadoes had passed through the kitchen while Chef Norrie worked.

When his licensing friends gathered in Topeka for a fun trip, it always began with an academic session in Norrie's den. He would rule the discussion, referee it, grill his guests and argue with them. Then, when it was over, he would stand up, announce, "End of class. Let the games begin." Then the fun could start. Norrie loved funny stories, whether telling them or hearing them.

Speaking of hearing, Norrie's hearing grew poor over the years. He and Coley Baker, VT, once upset an entire diner in a small town because Norrie, researching sexual abuse in child care at the time, insisted on pursuing the subject several decibels above normal conversational tones. Whenever Coley, conscious of the reactions of diners even if Norrie was not, tried to give his report in a more discreet tone, Norrie would bark, "Speak up, Coley. I can't hear you."

Norrie was always intense about his work. He would call at odd hours requiring information or opinions on whatever he was researching. Whenever he considered he had what he needed he would simply hang up without remembering to say goodbye.

On the podium, Norrie was not a particularly exciting speaker. His style was academic, formal and frequently punctuated by an inquiring "Uh?" when he wanted to make sure we were actively considering a point. Most of us never heard anybody but Norrie use words like "prefatory statement" or "concretion." When he announced a break and return time, he would slap the table for emphasis and remind us, "And people should always honor their contracts." To Norrie, honoring a contract was the basis for all human interactions, a point of view that clearly applied to all parties and to all activities in the licensing function. As his sight faded, he sometimes resorted to having his papers read, after which he would take questions and lead discussions. Still, we flocked to his presentations because his reasoning, scholarship and analysis were always clear and compelling. He loved a good debate, but we knew in advance not to expect mercy if we indulged in sloppy thinking or careless statements. He demanded more of us, and we were always better because he did.

At the time Norrie began his concentration on human care licensing, the field was in considerable conceptual disarray, using a confusion of techniques borrowed from licensors' original disciplines and from its host agency, usually social work. Licensing programs often lacked a sense of identity and were unsure in the exercise of their legal responsibilities. Licensing agencies were further weakened by flawed statutes and rules. Licensors, often lacking a secure understanding of the conceptual and legal foundations of their profession, were handicapped in their ability to lead the internal, public and political processes necessary to improve their ability to safeguard dependent consumers.

Norrie deserves much of the credit for leading the profession to its current state of development. At the time, few scholars were interested in licensing as a function, and the field wasn't large enough to command much visibility. He was tireless and persistent into his eighth decade in his efforts to bring order and pride to the profession. His teaching, writing, consultation, research and expert testimony made a profound difference in how we saw ourselves and in how others saw us. He directed the attention of leaders in related professions onto the field of licensing. His direct mentoring of licensing professionals was equally important in developing leadership in a number of states. He believed in growing his own colleagues and friends, often turning awed students into later professional collaborators as well as personal friends.

Norrie never achieved one of his visions, a formal academic degree for the profession. He did, however, help to establish a national association, NARA, which grew out of the professional strivings generated by one of his Tulane Licensing Institutes in 1976. He also actively participated in the development of NARA's Licensing Curriculum, published in 1988. This curriculum captured at the practitioner level the essence of his life's work with us and on behalf of the people we are charged to safeguard.

chs/8/97

©

1997