Many students at Hillsdale College remember Sue Wismar. It’s hard to forget her. She was one of the most beloved of house moms, and she left her mark on the Simpson dorm.
Wismar’s reign began when she arrived 10 years ago.
“When he showed me the dorm and told me how many boys were in there, I said, ‘I don’t know about that!’” Wismar said. “It was pretty wild and unruly when I got there.”
But Wismar’s presence soon tamed the men of Simpson. Senior Garrett Holt said meeting her was “a life-changing experience” and that she knew how to “strike the fear of God into you.” Each year when the new freshmen met Wismar, Holt said they experienced “sheer terror.”
“They had no idea what hit them,” Holt said.
The “wild and unruly” boys of Simpson had met a woman who was going to force them to grow up and work hard. Wismar was strict and firm – she yelled when necessary and never hesitated to tell them exactly what she thought about their behavior and how they could improve it.
“There are a lot of skills that young men haven’t learned, and one of them is how to run a vacuum cleaner,” Wismar said. “So I did teach a lot of young men how to run a vacuum cleaner.”
Despite Wismar’s tough love attitude, the boys at Simpson loved her.
“She always had this talk at the beginning of the year,” Holt said. “She said, ‘When you inevitably break up with your girlfriend, which you will around Thanksgiving break, then I’ll be there for you.’”
Affection for Wismar grew stronger until Simpson made its own T-shirts brandishing the words, “Sue’s Boys.”
“In the beginning when they started, I said, ‘Well can’t you think of a better name for yourselves?’” Wismar said, remembering when the boys were first discussing possible slogans for the T-shirts.
But Simpson had already settled on its trademark.
“It didn’t matter if you knew her too well, you were part of the dorm and therefore you were one of Sue’s Boys,” said junior Matt O’Sullivan.
If the Simpson boys wanted to impress their house mom or win her over, all they had to do was sweet-talk her using, according to Holt, “straight-up flattery.” As the Simpson boys grew into men, they came up with better ways to demonstrate their devotion.
Nate Jebb ’12 began a tradition of singing “That’s Amore” with an accordion and a guitar to serenade Wismar.
“They did that forever,” Wismar said.
Wismar not only brought order and humor to the Simpson dorm, she also brought inspiration and a chisel to grind her boys into better, stronger men.
“She was like Simpson’s George Washington,” Jebb said. Did she cut down a cherry tree? We don’t know. We just know she loved us, an all-American bombshell.”
When he was deciding whether or not to apply for the position of Head RA, O’Sullivan remembered his talk with Wismar and how she pushed him to apply for the position.
“If it weren’t for her I wouldn’t be in the position I have today,” O’Sullivan said.
At the end of last semester Wismar retired to spend more time to spend with her family. Simpson will not be the same without her.
“We all knew she had our back,” O’Sullivan said. “She would kind of go to bat for us.”
Even though the queen has stepped down from her throne, Wismar hopes to remain in touch with her boys. Wismar said she hopes to come up on a Sunday soon so she can visit with her boys and remind them how much she loves them.
A visit from Sue will not only cheer the men of Simpson, it will also encourage Wismar. Simpson’s unprecedented devotion to their house mom will not be easily forgotten.
They are, after all, Sue’s Boys.
