Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, March 6, 1990 TAG: 9003061813
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: TAMMY POOLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
"I was doing a survey project," he said. "My skin was burned from the sun. I had intestinal worms that I had had for many months. Blood flecks were on the inside of my underwear band from bug bites the night before; and I hadn't had a bath in so long that my body was breaking out in sores.
"At that moment, I said to myself, `Kid, if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.' "
Anywhere turned out to be Clinch Valley College in Wise. In 22 years at the college, O'Donnell has been a full-time professor, dean of students and athletic director.
O'Donnell has taught classes in three of the schools's four divisions, "everything but math and sciences," and in seven out of the 13 departments. Classes he has taught include French, English, Irish studies, humanity seminars, speech and world cultural geography.
When he's not teaching or solving students' problems, the 47-year-old professor can be found traveling abroad.
His urge to travel began when he visited Spain during his two years in the Peace Corps. "Before that, I was a 19-year-old college student from Jim Thorpe in eastern Pennsylvania who hadn't traveled more than 120 miles from home."
After leaving the Peace Corps, he traveled extensively in western Europe.
In 1973, he gave his wife, Tommie, an atlas and told her to write down anywhere in world she would go if she could. "She wrote down several places, and so did I. So I decided, heck, we might as well go around the world."
There were three major places they wanted to visit - the Holy Land, the Taj Mahal and the Valley of Pyramids near Cairo. "We rowed on lakes or rivers in neat places like the moat around the Imperial Palace in Tokyo, the Sea of Marmara in Turkey, the Alpensee Lake in southern Germany and the Nile River."
In western Siberia, he viewed Lake Baikal, which he describes as incredible. "It's over a mile deep and contains 20 percent of all the fresh water [on the Earth's surface]. It was beside eastern Siberia, which was the only thing separating us from the Pacific Ocean."
He usually travels on his own, but went on a tour in Russia. "In Irkutsk, 25 of the 26 people on the tour became desperately ill for five weeks. We had severe vomiting and diarrhea, and were totally without energy. The Russians treated us with black tea and black bread. We decided to go on with the tour anyway. When we got back home, the doctor who examined us found nothing wrong."
Other places he has traveled include Greece, the British Isles, Iceland, China and a Venezuelan mission, where he worked with several close friends who are nuns from Norton.
He has made numerous trips to Ireland and France, often taking students along. "I tell them where I'm going, and let them decide if they want to go. Everybody pays his own way. I think travel gives us a break from the routine. I feel that I have more to offer students when I get back."
He has backpacked extensively in the United States, from North Carolina to the Rocky Mountains and Alaska.
"There are four places in the world I never tire of showing people: Paris, anywhere in Ireland, the campus of Notre Dame and my home town of Jim Thorpe."
So how did an accomplished world traveler end up at Clinch Valley College?
The journey began when he attended Indiana University on a fellowship from the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship foundation.
"During the spring of my second year of graduate study at IU, I got a call from a former CVC academic dean inviting me to apply for a position as a teacher of French. I visited the campus, accepted the position, expecting to stay perhaps two years. The rest is history."
O'Donnell said he's had numerous job offers for more money, "but nothing that I wanted to do more than stay here and work with the students. I've grown and stayed with it. I look back on it all as a young teacher who had a chance to make an impact and a chance to develop an identity."
As dean of students, O'Donnell says he enjoys working with students and helping them solve or address their problems.
When he's not teaching or traveling, O'Donnell enjoys caring for Maeve, his dog; running; cross-country skiing; reading; and watching PBS.
He regularly donates blood and platelets, both locally and in North Carolina, having donated 20 gallons of blood to the American Red Cross. He also is a potential donor with the National Bone Marrow Registry.
What's next for this man of the world?
"I'm planning to visit Tibet and Australia this summer. It's going to take time and money, and I'm hoping I have enough of both of them."
by CNB