By Paul A. Anthony, Editor in Chief
Students stop short when they walk into Dr. Bill Rankin’s office. The busy wall fills their view, and their eyes move slowly, trying to take it all in. Their mouths drop open as they begin to comprehend what they see.
And then they laugh.
Covering an entire wall in the office are panels upon panels of comic strips. Dozens of Far Side characters and hundreds of Dilberts joke and laugh and live and die on Rankin’s wall, ceiling tiles and from the sides of his desk.
“They’re kind of offbeat,” says the assistant professor of English as he looks at the yellowing, faded strips he has been collecting for more than 10 years. “It’s something useful. When students want me to look over a paper, while I’m reading it, they can browse the wall.”
Rankin’s offbeat, somewhat irreverent sense of humor contrasts that of his wife, Sherry, who works in the office next to his as an instructor of English.
“He’s totally out of control now,” Sherry said of her husband’s comic collection. “They’re not even funny now.”
The two enjoy a marriage and a professional relationship that have gained the respect of students and colleagues alike.
“They seem to be really good friends,” said Dr. Steve Weathers, associate professor of English. “That strikes me as a really good thing to achieve in a marriage. I think the Rankins are people who will always be friends.”
That friendship is apparent through the playful banter in which they engage as they discuss their careers. An example:
“Sherry’s always been the better teacher,” Bill begins, then turns to smile broadly at his wife as she objects.
“You’ve won teacher of the year three times!” she protests, a smile playing on her face.
“That was an accident,” he responds over her laughter.
Regardless of who is better, colleagues and students agree that both Rankins are intelligent, superb teachers who are adept at making the key connection with students even when they’re not teaching.
“They care about what you do outside of the classroom,” said Sarah Braim, sophomore English major from Scappoose, Ore, who has taken both teachers’ classes. “They’re pretty cool people.”
The two met at Harding University in 1986, when Sherry was a junior English major and Bill was a freshman French and architecture major. Bill began taking English classes for a minor, and soon decided to leave architecture in favor of literature.
“We could have had money, and then I went and ruined it,” he jokes.
Sherry waited for Bill to graduate, which he did by completing two majors in just three years, and the two were married. They earned their master’s degrees together at the University of California-Riverside, and six days after their 1989 graduation, Sherry gave birth to their only child, Emily.
Sherry said they would have gotten their doctorates then, as well, but “then we had a baby and figured a job would be good.”
That fall they came to ACU when Bill joined the English faculty. They’ve been here ever since, with a four-year break in the mid- 1990s for Bill’s doctorate at the University of Minnesota, which is about the time he began collecting comic strips. Sherry taught part-time before the sojourn north and full-time since they returned.
Although being married while they’ve worked together for about 10 years has been tough on some, Sherry said, the two of them have always made it work .
“Occasionally the lines blur between work and home,” she said. “It’s hard to find time that’s not work related.”
“It’s not dreadfully bad,” Bill interjected. “Our poor daughter-she’s the one who suffers.”
Sherry agreed, saying Emily finds them “abnormal.”
“But she’s 13,” Sherry added. “That’s what she’s supposed to think.”
The pair’s close relationship is partly shown through their books. To save money, they bought only one set while going through graduate school. Now they share from the huge bookshelf behind Sherry’s desk.
And it’s her office that looks like an English professor’s workspace. Rows of old encyclopedias line a shelf to the side of her desk. The giant bookshelf behind her is stacked to overflowing with books of all kinds. Next to the door is another shelf chock-full of English textbooks. And she’s read most of the books in her room, just like Bill’s read all the comics in his.
The difference between the adjoining offices on the third floor of Chambers Hall reveals the differences between the occupants.
While Bill is outgoing, passionate and flamboyant, Sherry is quieter and more reserved. While Bill is ruddy, red-haired and has a head to which he pays tribute (“A Tribute to Bald-Headed Men”) on his door, Sherry is brown-haired and pale-skinned-with no self-deprecating tributes upon her door.
“Sherry’s brilliance is not immediately perceived,” Weathers said, referring to the ease with which her husband overshadows her. “Sherry is an astonishingly bright person. I’ve often said Sherry’s the smartest person on this hall.”
The similarities-their intelligence, their affinity for the written word, their love for each other-have created a unique relationship. The two fill in for each other in classes, and they bounce new ideas off each other. In college, they helped each other with papers, and Sherry helped Bill with his doctoral dissertation.
Both profess a love for their students and encourage their pupils to call them at home with questions and problems.
“Just don’t call at 1 a.m.,” Sherry adds with a grimace.
And their differences have created a dynamic couple as unique as a wall full of comic strips.
“My sense of humor is sort of cheap and flashy,” Bill said, glancing at his wife as she begins to object. “Sherry’s is subtle and atomic. It’s amazing; she always makes me laugh.”
