A program at the Princeton Public Library asks participants to reflect, explore and share their convictions
By Adam Grybowski
A prisoner gave the best interpretation of a James Joyce story Keith Wheelock ever heard.
Then chairman of the People & Stories/ Gente y Cuentes program, Mr. Wheelock discussed short stories with the prisoners of Somerset County Jail. “What it taught me is that if you let people explore you will discover that everyone has a story and everyone has wisdom,” he says.
Today Mr. Wheelock is an instrumental force behind This I Believe, the international program that archives short essays of people’s core beliefs, regularly aired on NPR. His father, Ward, started the program in 1951 as a memorial to his wife with Edward R. Murrow and CBS executive William Paley.
Despite the program’s soaring popularity — 39 million listeners tuned in weekly — it was cancelled in 1955, after Ward Wheelock’s death. Fifty years later Dan Gediman revived This I Believe in consultation with Mr. Wheelock, who had also begun to resuscitate it as a community program. He will facilitate a new four-session This I Believe program at the Princeton Public Library, beginning April 7. It is designed for ages 55 and older.
”It works the way life should work but never does,” Mr. Wheelock says during an interview at the library, a carton of orange juice in front of him.
”There is an environment and an opportunity, and it depends on each of these individuals. One speaks up and it triggers another. As this process occurs, some of the more reticent people feel they are in an environment where they can share their beliefs and it will be supported. It’s a magical moment. But when you think about life there are not many magical moments like that.”
Personal beliefs tend to have a common core, he says, yet people rarely take time to reflect and explore them. “So often thinking is not part of the process of doing. Something that becomes increasingly important in life are your ground rules or beliefs. And very often people go through life without specifically exploring them.”
Personally, Mr. Wheelock, 75, has concluded he wants to devote his energy to work that brings him joy and satisfaction. “You begin to discover what is truly important to you, and that’s a revelation,” he says. A Montgomery resident and former council member, he teaches history at Raritan Valley Community College, serves on the board of trustees for Eisenhower Fellowships and is a devoted grandfather.
”I have more than enough to do,” he says. “Why am I still teaching at the age of 75? I love it, the interchange and the challenge and being able to help people. What brings me joy and satisfaction is my family and my grandkids and doing things with people in the community.”
In 1954, when Mr. Wheelock was 20 years old, he became the second youngest contributor to have a This I Believe essay broadcast.
”I was in a stage in college where I knew all the answers,” the former ambassador and two-time author says. He recently composed a second essay. “I was beginning to understand what the important questions were. The themes are somewhat the same. The difference is experience. In life, if one learns from failure I ought to have a Ph.D.”
Because of their maturity, Mr. Wheelock says, older men and women possess a greater tolerance toward diverging ideas. “This is the wonderful thing about the 55-plus group. The objective is the sharing of beliefs, the acknowledgement that different people can have different beliefs and they’re all valid.”
Mr. Wheelock first brought This I Believe into his college classroom, instructing his young students to write essays. “Their response was overwhelming,” he says. “The students found, once they got into it, their writing improved, their thinking improved. And I saw students years later who said this was the most meaningful experience they had in college.”
Though schools were an ideal place to facilitate such essays, Mr. Wheelock felt the people who could most benefit from the exercise — “older people who have gone through life’s experiences” — were being excluded.
To test the idea, Mr. Wheelock formed in 2007 a group at Stonebridge at Montgomery, a senior living community. “What I found was my instinct was absolutely correct,” he says. Interest in his next session for adults, at Raritan, resulted in a waiting list and a program extension.
The happiness of the participants, more than midway through often-difficult lives, surprised Mr. Wheelock.
”There are so many bad things in life there tends not be a focus on what is good,” he says. “And frankly I think there is far more good than bad. People tend to talk more about the bad. What I find, with these different groups, these individuals basically feel happy. They’ve done their heavy lifting in life.”
Self-selection contributes to the positive atmosphere, Mr. Wheelock believes. “Unless people are comfortable listening to others share their beliefs they’re not going to show up. I’ve never heard a critical personal word from anyone in all these sessions.” Attacking another’s beliefs “would be astonishing.”
Men of Mr. Wheelock’s generation tend to share their feelings reluctantly if at all, he says. “We were brought up in an environment of boys don’t cry. What I find encouraging is that among the men who participate there does not seem to be a reluctance to share what they feel and what they believe.”
Mr. Wheelock’s goal is to create an ambience where people feel comfortable discussing their beliefs. “There are no requirements,” he says. “In a sense” — he hesitates — “it’s almost like a Quaker meeting, where if someone feels moved they get up and speak. They may speak a sentence, they make speak more.”
In addition to discussion, participants will listen to recordings of past essays as well as read them. The program is a follow-up to one held last fall — a program that “blew my mind,” Mr. Wheelock says.
Each group member wrote an essay, which is neither required nor the distinct goal. On his desk Mr. Wheelock keeps a photo of the group, taken at a reunion. The picture “reflects joy and satisfaction,” he says. “This gives me as much joy as being with my grandkids.”
He pauses to consider the prospect of meeting the next group. “I’m excited,” he says. “There’s no question it’s going to work. How it’s going to work I don’t know. The key point is that these people are the ingredients of a bouillabaisse. How they come together is up to them.”
- This I Believe, a four-session program for adults 55 and over, will begin at the Princeton Public Library, 65 Witherspoon St., Princeton, April 7, 10 a.m. Free. Space is limited and registration is required; 609-924-9529; www.princetonlibrary.org