During my freshman year as a journalism student at USC's College of Mass Communications and Information Studies, I had the privilege of interviewing and writing a story on Charles Bierbauer. Impressed and inspired by his many journalistic accomplishments, I chose to focus the story on his career in hopes of encouraging other journalism students. While Bierbauer's last semester as our dean begins, I wanted to dust off this old story to remind everyone how blessed we have been to have such a distinguished journalist lead our college. Thank you, Dean Bierbauer, for being such a humble interviewee for a nervous little freshman and for encouraging me to continue in the Journalism School.
After living in seven different countries and working with the White House longer than any U.S. president besides Franklin D. Roosevelt, Charles Bierbauer knows how to roll with the punches.
As Dean of the College of Mass Communications and Information Studies at the University of South Carolina, Bierbauer spends his time teaching students about journalism and the forks of life.
“Life is not a continuum,” Bierbauer said. “You do not move on a straight line. You come to forks in the road daily, to some degree. And sometimes really big ones.”
For Bierbauer, these forks included dropping out of college after his freshman year and joining the Army. Once there, Bierbauer was sent to language school where he learned to speak Russian.
“Well, that’s a longer story,” Bierbauer said, getting up to make a quick cup of coffee before diving into his years as a Russian-speaking American soldier.
Moments later, he sat back down, steaming coffee in hand. With a smirk, he recalled his days learning about the moon-chasing Russians.
“This was the late ‘50s,” Bierbauer said. “Sputnik had been launched, or actually the ‘60s. We were worried about the Russians and there was a language there was a need for.”
After learning Russian for a year at the Army Language School in California, Bierbauer returned to college. He added as many language courses to his academic schedule as he could, eventually earning him a Bachelor’s in Russian on top of his journalism degree.
Bierbauer’s career in journalism was already underway when he decided to earn a Master’s in the subject. By earning a journalism degree, he was able to enhance his “journalistic passions and preparations,” which he often practiced outside of class.
Before earning his journalism and Russian degrees at Penn State, Bierbauer worked for the WKAP Radio as the weekend news reporter for a radio station in Allentown, Pennsylvania in the early 1960s. A small city with a population of about 130,000, Allentown served as the kick-start city of Bierbauer’s impressive journalism career.
After graduate school, Bierbauer went to work with the Associated Press in Pittsburgh. However, because of another fork, he only stayed there for six months before taking a fellowship in Europe.
In a city then called Belgrade, in a country then called Yugoslavia, Bierbauer finished his Master’s thesis before finding a full-time job with the old Westinghouse Radio Network covering Eastern Europe.
Eventually, Bierbauer found his way back to America where he worked as CNN’s White House Correspondent for nine years.
As a fairly young news program, CNN offered Bierbauer new ways to grow his knowledge in journalism. Technology was changing, but Bierbauer found no trouble in adapting.
“It’s just a progression,” Bierbauer said. “There’s going to be something new. That’s the constancy, it’s change.”
Change fit well into Bierbauer’s rapid schedule. With every day unlike the last, he quickly adapted to the inevitable forks placed on his winding road through life.
Bierbauer often obediently put down a story he may have been developing for weeks to pick up something new his editor gave him.
“You could start the day saying, ‘Here’s what I think I’m going to do today,’” Bierbauer said, “and the editor calls you up and says, ‘We’d really like you to go to Berlin and look into something else.’”
Bierbauer’s assignments often brought him to foreign lands, such as Beirut in the Middle East. But whatever challenge came his way, whatever new part of the world he felt he needed to report in, Bierbauer said he was never afraid to take the next train out.
While speaking about his expansive moves from country to country, Bierbauer took a slow sip of his coffee, allowing himself to organize the cities in chronological order.
Successfully naming all countries on the first try, Bierbauer said his progression of homes went from Belgrade to Austria to Germany to England to Philadelphia to Russia and finally back to Germany.
After around half a century, Bierbauer’s love and gratitude for his journalism career and the forks that led him through it continues. He proves his passion through his deanly duties and involvement with USC students.
“The reality is, any of the things that we teach here have highly transportable skills,” Bierbauer said. “It’s gathering information and synthesizing information. It’s turning that into a news article, a magazine story, a public relations campaign. It’s all of the gathering, synthesizing and communication process.”
With one final sip of coffee, Bierbauer sat back and smiled. His stories prove that no one’s path through life stays straight. No matter the forks in one’s path, they will always lead to new adventure.
