Forensics at Gustavus

Gustavus Adolphus College has a storied past in competitive speech and debate dating back more than 100 years. The College secured membership in the Minnesota Intercollegiate Oratorical Association in 1901 and by 1913 boasted its first state oratorical champion in S. Bernhard Wennerberg ’14. In 1923 Gustavus was one of four Minnesota charter members of Pi Kappa Delta, the national honor society in forensics, and a year later Professor Evan Anderson began a 39-year tenure as head of the speech department that would establish the College’s reputation in the arts of oratory and persuasion. By 1929 he was fielding 17 debate teams to compete in 27 intercollegiate debates, and in the early ’30s the College produced two Pi Kappa Delta national champion debate teams and a number of state, regional, and national oratorical and peace oratory contest winners. In 1942 Gustavus representatives captured first prizes in both the men’s and women’s state oratorical contests.

Successes continued into the 1960s, and the College claimed another oratorical champion when Ron Ford ’74 won the Interstate Oratorical Association’s 1974 national championship. More recently, the program has produced four international champions: Star Peltier ’98 in impromptu speaking, at the International Forensics Tournament in Lisbon, Portugal, in 1998; Alex Gulck ’02 in prose interpretation and Leah Hansen ’02 in impromptu speaking, both in Paris in 2000; and Jay Reding ’03, a double winner in informative speaking and impromptu speaking, in Rome in 2002.

But the 2004—05 Gustavus forensic team may prove to be strongest and most celebrated among all those the College has produced. Under the tutelage of Kristofer Kracht, visiting instructor of communication studies, who has directed the team while Associate Professor Phillip Voight has been on leave, the team placed in the top five at 9 of 22 meets leading up to the Minnesota Collegiate Forensics Association State Championships in February 2005 (including sweepstakes wins at UW-River Falls, Bethany Lutheran College, and South Dakota State University), and 22 individuals earned honors—most of them several times.

At the Minnesota state championships, the Gusties finished second overall in the open division, behind only Minnesota State University, Mankato. The parliamentary debate team of sophomore Henry Stokman (Minnesota Lake, Minn.) and first-year Alex Knewtson (Mapleton, Minn.) earned first place, giving Gustavus the state parliamentary debate championship for the third consecutive year. Sophomore Andrea Carlile, a political science major from Chatham, Ill., finished second in persuasive speaking, qualifying for the Interstate Oratorical Association National Contest in late April. The Interstate Oratorical Association’s National Contest, which is the nation’s oldest annual public speaking contest, brings together 60 of the top collegiate persuasive speakers in the country, with each state allowed to qualify only two competitors. Gustavus had not sent a speaker for this event in more than 20 years before Carlile qualified; she will be the only Minnesota private college student to attend this year’s event in Boston, Mass., on April 21—23.

Following the state championships, Gustavus competed in three more regional tournaments before readying for the Pi Kappa Delta National Tournament in mid-March. Senior Becky Kuehl, a communication studies major from Trimont, Minn., was awarded the Valley Forensic League’s Returning Student Scholarship, becoming the first Gustie to earn that honor. Gustavus won the Parliamentary Debate League of the Upper Midwest’s year-end sweepstakes for the second time in three years, and senior Brandon Gillette, a philosophy major from Garden City, Kan., was named top speaker for the 2004—05 season.

Competing among 72 schools and more than 400 competitors from throughout the United States at the Pi Kappa Delta National Tournament and Convention at Webster University in St. Louis, Mo., on March 17—19, Gustavus came away with second place in the individual events team sweepstakes and fifth place in the combined team sweepstakes (which adds debate results to the individual events total), and seven team members placed in the top eight in at least one of their events. Kuehl was one of nine students named to the 2005 Pi Kappa Delta All-America team and also received the society’s L.E. Norton Scholarship, which is awarded to the top All-American; she is the first Gustie to receive either of these honors. She was also named to the 2004—05 American Forensics Association National Individual Events All-American Team on the basis of her scholastic achievement, forensic success, and community service—also a first for the College.

At the Pi Kappa Delta National Tournament and Convention, Phillip Voight was named to the Pi Kappa Delta National Council and Andrea Carlile was selected as the at-large student representative on the national council.

Kuehl and Carlile led a contingent of nine national tournament qualifiers from the Gustavus team —in categories ranging from persuasion and communication analysis to impromptu, after-dinner speaking, poetry, and dramatic—to the AFA National Individual Events Tournament at Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kan., on April 1—4. Results will be posted.

Senior English major Peter Hedberg, St. Louis Park, Minn., who interned in the Office of Marketing and Public Relations during the spring 2005 semester, researched and wrote the first draft of this article. Quarterly editor Steve Waldhauser ’70 contributed to late drafts as the forensics team added honors on a weekly—and sometimes daily—basis.