Tom SpottedHorse started employment at Haskell in 1990 and had his retirement service on September 1st 2017. Along with all those years working at Haskell he has had many memories.
SpottedHorse’s retirement reception began with an honor song. Followed by a few words from Dr. Venida Chenault, Haskell’s current President. SpottedHorse was then gifted with a blanket from the university, and also a pillow from his mother. The reception was finished after SpottedHorse told a story of a night he was working as a Residential Advisor while also finishing his speech with a reassurance he would still be around campus in some way.
When asked what the most rewarding part of working at Haskell was SpottedHorse explained that, “working with students,” was the best aspect of Haskell. SpottedHorse is also a Haskell Alumni and was a boarding school student also. Living in boarding school helped SpottedHorse recognize the importance of housing for students.
Recounting his craziest memory of Haskell SpottedHorse responded that there, “were too many to name.” One individual memory that stood out he said was, “When I used to work nights a big snow storm had come through. There was a large crowd of guys standing out front taunting my OK Hall boys. This was before the age of cell phones but my boys starting running out of all the front entrances, almost at the same time. As they got outside the other boys rained snowballs at them. Well it was on then! More guys came rushing out of OK Hall and started returning fire with their own snowballs. They started chasing them south across campus as they retreated back towards Blalock. There they got more reinforcements, then other dorms joined in. I could hear them yelling from OK Hall as they got louder. The next thing I heard was they were all at Adobe Flats on the other side of the stadium. It sounded like a battle was going on there, with shouting and blood curdling war whoops. I had to check it out so another student and I walked over there from OK Hall. I swear to this day when we got over there we saw at least 100-150 students in a snowball fight. They were all over Adobe Flats throwing round white snowballs at each other and running all around the Flats. It looked and sounded like the Battle of Little Big Horn. It seemed like the entire school emptied out of their dorms to join in. I went back to my dorm and listened to the battle rage on and on. Finally after a while my boys made it back to the dorm claiming victory with war whoops and raised fists. Indeed, “OK HALL – WHERE LEGENDS ARE MADE”.” While also expressing that wasn’t the craziest but it was a memory that stood out the most.
Kristen Torres, Senior and niece of Tom SpottedHorse, stated in her academic career that SpottedHorse had “helped me a lot. Whenever I needed help in a situation I knew I could count on him (SpottedHorse) to resolve it.” Torres stated her most memorable moment with SpottedHorse was when, “I found out he was my uncle. I found out when I first came here around spring of 2016. On-the-clock I was just another student to him, but after he’d get off work him and I would get to meet up and catch up. To me it was great having family around when the rest live 5 hours away.”
SpottedHorse explained he’s going to miss the people, students and coworkers, the most. Yet he also understands people retiring happens, but the good thing about it is you get to meet new people as the position gets filled and as the one retiring goes on seeing new aspects of life.
