Lifelong learner at age 84

After a 42-year career with Caterpillar, Byron DeHaan and his late wife Sylvia might have migrated to a warmer climate where Byron, a golfer since high school, could have hit the links everyday.

Instead, the DeHaans decided in 1991 to remain in Peoria. Byron golfed, continued singing and performing with his guitar, and returned to something he hadn’t done since 1948 in Kansas. He became a student again. After enrolling at Bradley that fall, Caterpillar’s retired director of public affairs continued taking classes, and then more classes, for 12 years. His Bradley transcript shows a phenomenal 186 credit hours with almost all A’s. DeHaan rejected the possibility of auditing courses, preferring to write the papers and take the tests like his classmates. He has a 3.94 GPA.

“I thought, ‘I’ll just take a few courses’ and one thing leads to another,” says DeHaan, now 84. “I enjoyed being with the BU students.” DeHaan valued the interaction and fellowship with the teachers — many of whom he counts as friends today. In 2000 he was named an honorary Bradley alumnus.

DeHaan believes that Bradley’s primary strength is great teaching. “Of my 186 hours, only three were led by a grad student.” There are too many professors to list, but he singles out several by name: Dr. Kyle Dzapo, Dr. John Jost, Dr. Bob Fuller, Dr. Merrill Foster, Dr. Kevin Stein, Dr. Greg Guzman, Ken Hoffman, and Randy Carlson.

With a lifelong love of music, many of DeHaan’s courses were in the music department. He joined Bradley’s Community Chorus in 1989, but back problems forced him to bow out in 2007. He also enjoyed art and art history courses, and became adept at oil painting and the potter’s wheel. Courses in Shakespeare, history, historical geology, and oceanography helped him more fully appreciate annual trips to Europe with his wife. “If you have an education about a country and then you go there, it doubles the pleasure,” he notes.

Encouraged by Illinois poet laureate Kevin Stein, DeHaan began writing poetry. In 1999 he won the Sipple poetry prize at Bradley for his poem, Requiem for Mozart and Us. With endorsements from Stein and ICC English professor Jim Sullivan, his book of 32 poems was published by Converse Publishing in 2004.

Mens sana in corpore sano, or a sound mind in a sound body, is a motto of Cicero that DeHaan embraces. “Education helps you better understand and enjoy life,” he says simply. Following his dozen years of Bradley courses, DeHaan earned 40 credit hours at Illinois Central College. He has participated in numerous classes and trips sponsored by the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Bradley. According to DeHaan, OLLI is extremely well run — high praise from the retired executive.

An avid Bradley basketball fan, DeHaan doesn’t miss a home game. He and his wife funded an endowed scholarship in 1989, which benefits a student in communications and another in music. They were founding members of Bradley’s Friends of Music group in 1994 and continue to support the program.