When Kathy Manos moved to Cleveland 52 years ago, she hit the ground running. While husband Eli built a reputation in the legal community, she became a recognized expert in adult education – while raising four children, serving on a couple of boards, and owning and running the popular Lewis & Clark Outfitters store on Shaker Square.

Hired as director of the Office of Continuing Education at CWRU in 1987– after having volunteered there for 10 years – Kathy is retiring in April 2011. On an unusually warm and sunny February afternoon, she shared her thoughts on what it meant to be an American Jew during World War II; how a six-week education course at Boston University planted the seeds for her love of teaching; how she worked tirelessly to grow her “fifth child,” CWRU's continuing education program; and how important “staying on the bright side of things” is for successful aging.

When and where you were born and raised?

I was born February 3, 1932 in New York City. I lived all my life on Long Island until I went to college.

What did your parents do?

My father was always in sales: shoes, insurance, stocks, all kinds of things. He retired fairly early.

My mother started working late in life when she went to work for the United Jewish Appeal as a fund raiser. The people she dealt with were all in Westchester, New York, people like the owners of Gimbels Department Store and Abraham and Straus in New York City.

Which of your parents do you think had the most influence on who you are today?

I've thought about that quite a bit. You tend to when you have four children who are so different from one another.

I think I'm a combination of both. My mother was one of those people who read constantly. She was very intellectual and very interested in theater. In fact, she was an actress early on in her life. My father was outgoing and interested in music and sports, though he didn't ever play. .

Where are you in the sibling line-up?

I'm the oldest of three. My sister was a year-and-a-half younger and my brother was seven years younger.

We [she and husband Eli] had four kids, two boys and two girls, and it's interesting the way your birth order influences who your are, what you do. [Laughs] Michael, our oldest boy, is a lot like me.

What were you good at in school?

I was always good at sports: basketball, softball, hockey, but I didn't swim. And I was also a good student.

We had Latin at my school, but they didn't have a fourth year Latin class, so my senior year I lobbied the school to start one, and they did. There were only six other people in the class.

I was usually at the top of the class, mainly because I was always so interested in all my subjects. And I was in a lot of clubs and on a lot of committees, including the foreign affairs committee. And I was on the school newspaper, too.

You came of age under the double cloud of the Depression and World War II. How do you think that shaped the person you are today? Or did it?

In a lot of respects my family wasn't touched by the Depression the way other families were. But the war, that was different. I was 10 when the war started, old enough to know what was going on.

We were Jewish, and we saw how the war was affecting Jews. We followed the war in the paper. We put up a big map and put pins where things were happening. My father was an air raid warden and we had a victory garden: we grew corn, tomatoes, potatoes and lots of root vegetables, but the soil was so sandy they weren't very good. My parents were usually at the USO two nights a week entertaining troops. [Laughs] My father was so angry that he was too old to go to war.

We lived in a Jewish community, and there were a lot of people coming into the community – to live with relatives – from Europe. That's one of the main things I remember about World War II, those people coming, with a couple of suitcases. That's all they had.

Years later, in 1952, I got the chance to go to England and saw the devastation in Plymouth where I was staying. That's when I realized how lucky we were that we were where we were during the war and that we won the war.

You got your BA at Radcliffe in 1953. What did you major in there?

I'd planned on majoring in American History and Literature. But to do that at Radcliffe, you had to take a lot of extra exams. So I ended up just getting the American History degree and taking a lot of courses in literature.

I was working at the Harvard Crimson while I was in college, selling ads. It was an interesting situation. Most of the people at the paper were male and they were much older because they'd come back from the war and were finishing their education.

What were you planning on doing with a history degree?

I was planning on becoming a lawyer, and I really liked my first year at law school at Columbia University in New York City. The courses – on development of legal institutions, criminal law, contracts, things like that – were very interesting. But when I looked at what I'd be studying the second year – taxes, accounting, property, trusts, wills – I dropped out and found a job at Dell Comics.

I was supposedly a secretary, but I was such a poor secretary that I ended up writing copy and doing promotional work. One of my jobs was signing Fess Parker's signature on pictures and handing them out to Davy Crockett fans at malls. When I left Dell, I went to a small magazine where I made more money, but it was boring.

How and when did you meet your husband, Eli?

Eli was at Harvard and I was at Radcliffe. We were both majoring in American History and we were both juniors and had been in a lot of classes together, but I didn't know him and I had a boyfriend back home, too. My sister fixed me up with him my junior year. He played football and I'd go to the games and watch him play, then to the parties afterwards, and then I'd go home. And that was perfectly fine with both of us, till we realized we really liked each other. [Laughs] With a name like Eli, I thought he was Jewish, but it turned out that he was Greek.

He went into the army – this was the time of the Korean War – and we got engaged. We had invitations out [for the wedding] and I was really worried that he wouldn't be back for the wedding, but he made it home. We married in 1955, and were married for 54 years. He died in 2009.

When Eli came back from the war and we got married he went to law school at Harvard and I went to work, first at MIT, in the Acoustic Engineering Department, then in Natick, Massachusetts. When he graduated from law school [in 1958], Eli came to Cleveland to begin studying for the Ohio Bar Exam. I came a bit later due to work.

Eli went right into practice?

Yes, when he passed the bar he went to work for his brother, John Manos, who became a federal judge. Then he went to work for the Ohio Attorney General's Office. And then he joined his own law firm.

So what did you do?

While I was working at MIT, I'd decided that I wanted a teaching degree, so I enrolled in the education program at Boston University to get my master's degree. After just six weeks, they threw me into a second grade class in Natick, Massachusetts. I was there for two years, while Eli finished law school. When I finished the year there I came to Cleveland, and got a job with the Cleveland School District, teaching at Woodland Hills School. I was there until our first son, Michael, was born. When he turned one, I got a position in East Cleveland, eventually teaching 3rd grade.

You are probably best-known in Cleveland as director of the Office of Continuing Education at Case Western Reserve University. What got you interested in adult education. In other words, how did you jump from teaching 3rd grad to teaching adults?

When I came to Cleveland, I became the Radcliffe representative on a committee for one of the continuing education programs. And I loved it. Then I taught some Living Room Learning classes for the Continuing Education Program. And I loved that.

While I was doing that, I also went back to school, and got certified in the Positive Education Program and went into the Shaker School System tutoring special needs kids. And I worked in a store I owned, Lewis & Clark Outfitters – think L.L. Bean – that a friend and I had opened at Shaker Square.

Eventually I became President of ACE [the Association of Continuing Education], a volunteer organization that helps to raise funds and promote continuing education at CWRU. And in 1987, when she was about to retire, Pam Hume, the director, asked me if I was interested in becoming director of the Office of Continuing Education. I said yes and put in my application. They told me they wanted a PhD for the program and that I was second on the list of people they were considering.

So how did you end up with the job?

[Laughs] The other person turned it down and I've been here since 1987. That's 24 years.

I was amazed back then that they thought a PhD was required for this position. You didn't, and still don't, need a PhD for this job, you need organizational and management and people skills. And you need someone who is passionate about adult education.

And how did you come by that passion? Did you learn it? Did you have a mentor or mentors?

I'd done some teaching at community college, and since a lot of the students were “non-traditional,” older adults, I'd picked up a lot of insight into how older adults learned there. And I'd taught classes for the Office of Continuing Education, and taken classes through the Office, so I had a feel for how things were done there from both sides of the table. And I'd worked with Pam on different programs and projects over the years, and learned a lot from her seeing how she did things.

When I became director, I knew a lot, but I didn't know what the faculty at Case Western Reserve did and could do, so every time a new university catalogue came out I'd go through it, finding out who was teaching what and what different departments offered so we could grow the Senior Scholars Program and the off-campus programs, like Living Room Learning…I even started a Living Room Learning class at my house and I've been doing it ever since then.

And we decided to grow the programs because more and more people were retiring early, especially men. We made it a point to have more courses – history, philosophy, science – men would be interested in. But everything I did melded with everything else that was going on.

Long before you, yourself hit “seniordom,” you were doing programs specifically focused on seniors. So the question is: why did you, and have you, done so much programming aimed at seniors?

A lot of what I have always done, except for the store on Shaker Square, has been focused on education, and a lot of that has been focused on older adults. [Laughs] And I focused on those kinds of things because I was looking for interesting things to do – including things for me.

What is it about you, personally , that has made you so good a planning programs for older adults?

When I'm planning, I think: What would I like to read, do, learn more about, know more about? That's a start, but I have a lot of help. [Pointing to a stack of letters and notes] People from the community are always sending in ideas. And I send out questionnaires, which allows the audience to tell me what they want.

When I can't find what they want among the experts at Case, then I try Cleveland State or John Carroll or Hiram or wherever.…And there are people who get in touch with the Office because they would like to teach. You know, instructors aren't just professors, there are people with a lot of expertise right here in our community.

It's obvious you love learning and books. What are some of your other passions?

Theater! I grew up on Rogers and Hammerstein and being near New York City, we went to the theater all the time. I just came back from London and saw five plays. One of my big passions is Gilbert and Sullivan, so I go down to Wooster every year. And I always lead a group to the Shaw Festival.

I love to travel. And through the Office I was always traveling. The first trip I led was to Ireland. But probably Greece is my personal favorite place to visit. My husband's relatives always took us around. We even visited his parents' village on top of a mountain.

And, of course, my children and six grandchildren. Michael is in New York City. Peter is here. Phyllis lives outside of Portland , Oregon. And Linda is in Columbus.

You are retiring in April. What's the first thing you'll do “in retirement?”

[Laughs] I scheduled retirement so that all the classes would be done, but it turns out that a couple will run longer, so I'll still be around. But when they are done – in June – I'm going to Alaska. I've always wanted to see Alaska.

You're active and healthy. What are you doing – on an ongoing basis – to maintain you physical health?

I've always played tennis and play as much tennis as I can at Shaker Skating Club. It's so close I can walk, so when I'm “retired” I'm hoping to do more swimming and yoga, too.

I don't drink coffee anymore, otherwise I haven't changed my eating habits. I like a bagel with lox and cream cheese in the morning; I like a salad or soup for lunch or maybe yogurt; and I tend to eat light at night, chicken, seafood, fish. If sweets are there – especially cookies – I'll eat them. If not I don't miss them. [Laughs] I've been the same weight for 10 years and my cholesterol is very good.

But you know, I've got a pace maker. One day I was playing tennis and I suddenly fainted. The EMS took me to urgent care and I had tests done and they gave me a monitoring vest to wear. During the night my heart stopped and the cardiologist called me and told me to come in immediately. They put in a pace maker and that was three years ago.

Your sharp as a tack. What are you doing to maintain your mental and emotional health?

I read-read-read. And I love crossword puzzles. And I'm constantly discussing things with the [Continuing Education] planning groups. I'm wondering, with retirement, whether I'll miss those groups, so I may stay in them.

I watch a lot of movies, too. I just saw The King's Speech , which I loved, and with Netflix I just watched The African Queen. My next one is Captain Hornblower, with Gregory Peck. It was made in 1951.

Everyone wants to age successfully, though every person's definition of what that is different. What's your definition of successful aging?

To me, successful aging means being able to do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do it.

You are 79, active, vital, involved. What are your time-tested tips for aging successfully.

Stay involved with people. Read. Exercise. And be happy. That's not always so easy. Sometimes you have to work at staying on the bright side of things.

Which accomplishment – personal or professional – are you the most proud of, and why?

Probably being the director of the Continuing Education Program. It's grown and expanded and become far more important to the community, not just Case, than it was. The quality of the programs grew, the number of programs grew, the number of people who took courses grew, and the feedback from them has always been positive.

But that's a hard question, because I'm proud of my family, how they have turned out, too.

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