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Young Lyndon insisted upon respect from his pupils. He spanked disorderly boys, tongue-lashed the girls. He taught fifth, sixth and seventh grades, demanded that his classes greet him daily with a loyal refrain:
How are you, Mr. Johnson? How are you today?
Is there anything we can do? We will do if we may.
We will stand by you to a man.
How are you, Mr. Johnson? How are you?
Lyndon insisted that the children learn English—something no other teacher had tried or cared about. He ordered his teachers to supervise organized play at lunchtime and they went on strike, but his board backed him up. He joined eagerly in the kids' play, spent much of his salary for playground equipment, often tackled the boys on the gravel football field.
By such tactics, Lyndon earned the kids' respect—and their affection as well. "He was eager for all of us to learn," recalls Mrs. Amanda Garcia, now a clerk in a San Antonio store. "We were all just Mexicans in those days and Mexicans didn't mean much. I believe he really loved us as human beings." Adds Juan Gonzales, 50, a civil servant at Fort Sam Houston: "He respected the kids more than any other teacher we ever had." Says Manuel Sanchez, 48, a grocer: "He made us speak English. We did not like it at the time, but now we are happy he did." Echoes Juanita Ortiz, a waitress: "I remember him telling us seventh graders that anybody could be anything he wanted to be if he worked hard at it. As young as he was, he was trying to teach us all he knew. He really cared."
All About String. Back at San Marcos, Lyndon took every course the college offered in government and history and did so well that he was permitted to teach two freshman classes in government. He formed a secret campus political group, the "White Stars," to seize control of campus government from the athlete-dominated "Black Stars," who were plotting to shift student funds away from dramatics and speech, devote them entirely to sports. He put up his friend, Wilgard Deason, for student president. "On the night before the election, we caucused and decided we were 20 votes short," says Deason. "The rest of us went to bed, but Lyndon went to work; when the ordinary man gives up, Johnson's just beginning." Deason won by eight votes.
Lyndon got his bachelor of science degree with a government major in August 1930, became an instructor in public speaking and business arithmetic at Sam Houston High in Houston the next month. Business Student James Sager recalls that Lyndon "could put a column of ten figures on the board and by the time he got to the bottom he'd have added them all up in his head." He fascinated his speech classes with his personal, pointed anecdotes, loved to throw out a single word and demand that his students ad-lib a speech about it. Once the word "string" stumped the class—but Lyndon promptly talked 15 minutes on the topic. Then, as now, Johnson hated to lose. His Sam Houston debate team came within one point of winning the state championship in 1931 —and Lyndon vomited backstage before he could congratulate the winners.