Former Eastern Professor Lucina Gabbard died May 23 in Houston of lung cancer. Gabbard was 84 years old.

Twenty years ago, Lucina Gabbard retired from Eastern’s English department after teaching for almost 40 years and publishing two books, “The Dream Structure of Pinter’s Plays” and “The Stoppard Plays.”

Gabbard taught and influenced two of Eastern’s most famous former students, Joan Allen and John Malkovich.

Krin Gabbard, Lucina’s son, lives in New York City in the same apartment complex as Allen.

“She met a lot of people who became famous through Eastern,” said Krin Gabbard. “Joan Allen and John Malkovich both really loved my mother and speak highly of her and my father.”

Krin Gabbard said that Allen still asks him about his parents when he sees her.

Glen Gabbard, Lucina’s other son, lives in Houston. Gabbard described his mother as “the best mother a man could have.”

“She was an amazing mother,” said Krin Gabbard. “She always had time for us. She read to us until she was blue in the face, she went to all our silly shows and went to all my brother’s silly baseball games.”

“She was always curious about other people,” said Glen Gabbard. “And I’m sure I became a psychiatrist partly because that curiosity rubbed off on me.”

“In the 1950s she was reading Freud,” said Krin Gabbard. “She was very intellectual and sped through her Ph.D dissertation.”

Gabbard completed her dissertation in nine months. Krin Gabbard teaches graduate students at Stoneybrook University in New York City and said that it can take years for students to finish their dissertations.

“That has to be some sort of world record,” said Krin Gabbard.

Both sons agreed that their mother had fond memories of Eastern.

“She devoted a lot of time to that school,” said Krin Gabbard. “She worked at Eastern from 1947 to 1967, full time. She was constantly being asked to work as a substitute in the English department.”

Gabbard taught freshman level English classes and some theater classes during this time.

“She said that Eastern had given her a chance to develop her identity as a scholar beyond being a mother,” said Glen Gabbard.

Krin Gabbard said that due to anti-nepotism policies found in the university environment during the time, his mother was not promoted as quickly as some of her colleagues because her husband was a faculty member in the theatre department.

“In 1975 she received her Ph.D and everything changed,” said Krin Gabbard.

Gabbard loved the faculty and students in the English department. And according to Dr. James Quivey, who was the English department chair when Gabbard was a professor, the faculty and students loved her.

“I’ve never known any other faculty member that has earned the respect, admiration and love from her students and colleagues like Lucy,” said Quivey.

“She just kind of blossomed after completing her Ph.D.”

Gabbard was hired as a full time faculty member in the English department.

“Her teaching was absolutely exemplary,” said Quivey. “And everybody knew it.”

She paired with her husband, Glendon, who directed plays and taught Theatre Arts at Eastern, to teach a six-credit class co-taught by the theatre and English departments.

“A professor from the theatre department would direct a scene from a show,” said Krin Gabbard. “And then the English Department faculty member would analyze it.”

Krin Gabbard remembered coming back to campus to visit his parents and meeting their students.

“They had an adoring bunch of students,” said Gabbard. “I would walk in and they thought I was a god because I had these two people for parents.”

Former student Gretchen Taylor took a theater class with Gabbard and said that Gabbard demanded respect from her students.

“We didn’t respect anyone,” said Taylor. “But we respected her because she was Lucy.”

Taylor described the New Orleans born Gabbard as a true southern woman and an excellent professor.

“Students who were able to take these classes knew how special they were,” said Quivey. “And were truly blessed.”

After retiring from Eastern in 1986, the Gabbards moved to Chicago.

“She said that she took early retirement to follow a dream of being an actress,” said Glen Gabbard.

Glen Gabbard said he tried to talk his mother out of pursuing acting but she did not listen to him.

“The moral of the story is don’t listen to your kids,” said Glen Gabbard.

The couple worked as actors in Chicago and appeared in films, plays, television programs and print ads.

“They just enjoyed a second career,” said Quivey.

Working under her maiden name of Lucinda Paquet, Gabbard appeared in “Groundhog Day,” “Prelude to a Kiss,” “My Best Friend’s Wedding,” “No Mercy,” “Novocaine,” and “Children on Their Birthdays.”

While in Chicago, Gabbard played the role of Grandma Joad in the Steppenwolf Theater’s production of “The Grapes of Wrath.” The production won a Tony Award while it was playing on Broadway in 1990.

In 1994 Gabbard received an honorary doctorate of humane letters degree from Eastern, recognizing her contributions to higher education and the acting community.

“She had an intellectual quality,” said Krin Gabbard. “That you wouldn’t necessarily expect.”

“She was brilliant,” said Quivey, “and had time for everyone and found something to respect in everyone.”

After moving to Houston in 2001 Gabbard appeared in “Sin City,” and “The Wendell Baker Story.”

“I went to Houston to spend time with her before she died,” said Krin Gabbard.

“She died before I flew home so I was staying in her apartment and again and again people would walk up to me and say how sorry they were, but they would go on and on about her and describe her as a surrogate mother to them.”

“In many respects she was a mother to a lot of us,” said Quivey. “She’s one of those people it’s difficult to talk about with out using words like amazing and extraordinary.”

Gabbard is survived by her husband, who currently lives in Houston and her two children, Glen O. Gabbard, a professor of psychiatry and psychoanalysis at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston and Krin Gabbard, a professor of comparative literature at The State University of New York in Stony Brook.

The family has requested that in lieu of flowers, those who wish to make a contribution send it to the Lucina Paquet Gabbard English Scholarship, EIU Foundation, 600 Lincoln Avenue, Charleston, IL 61920.

Former Eastern Professor Lucina Gabbard, 84, died May 23 in Houston of lung cancer.

(more…)