pcards and cats

Eulie,

Congratulations on retirement -- I remember two things about working with you over the years. First, getting called on pcard receipts once, twice and sometimes 3 times. It wasn't nagging, because I was negligent in turning them in. I did try to get them in on time :-). In the end most of them were turned in with a little help from you.

Second, the third year of the lynx project and you got in the field! We were in Isabella and got a call of another lynx in a trap on the gunflint trail but we we did not have another collar. You came up with the big blue station wagon and we got that one done too. Some of your pictures are still on the website (http://www.nrri.umn.edu/lynx/animals/collared/lynx_32.html).

Ron

Thank you Eulie!!

For over 20 years of helping me out and showing me the way when I needed it. From my first contact with you when you sent me a copy of the Duluth Sunday newspaper before I moved to Duluth, to your constant professional attention during my time with CWE, and your help in tracking down Jerry and Lucinda and their wandering ways since then, you’ve been a remarkably effective member and leader in that administrative office. But more importantly, you always accomplished those tasks with a characteristic style and grace that made working with you a pleasure. I’m glad I was able to be a colleague and friend and look forward to continuing that friendship.

Congratulations!
Carl

Job offer

Eulie, I hear you're retiring, congratulations! I have a cabinet post if you're interested, call me.
B. Obama

Next muffin meeting: EGMS for Dummies by E. Markham

Dear Eulie:

I saw firsthand how much you help folks figure out CWE/NRRI by the way you helped me. Coming from EPA, where things are done VERY differently, I was pretty lost my first year here, but you guided me through it. The problem is that you are still guiding me, I haven't learned everything yet, and now you are leaving.

So, to help save us all, perhaps when you get bored next fall you can come back and give a muffin meeting on 'EGMS for Dummies' to help a few more of us join the 21st century of grant proposal writing.

I will also greatly miss your friendship and support through all the adventures that my (and Dan's) families seem to have. But I know that you'll be having fun adventures with your own family, and I also know that if I need a shoulder, I have but to call or email you at home!

My husband greatly endorses retirement; I hope you enjoy yours as much or even more.

Val

Hi Eulie -

Thank you for a million things. Who else would clean the office refrigerator? Or refrain from cursing on the hundredth time I asked for the master key after forgetting my office keys 'in my other jacket pocket'?

But mostly, thank you for your cheery outlook and unending desire to just plain help. Whenever and however.

Now you'll have more time to explore the world on the good (=south) side of the bridge...

Enjoy!
Nick

Eulie,

Patience, poise, humor and always a sense of calmness in the eye of the grant submission storms. Thanks for all of your help on our past projects. You have provided me with a model of how grant support should be done.

I am sure you will enjoy retirement and the extra hours every day where you will have windows on the world. Enjoy!



Bruce Munson

Eulie,
I will miss your always welcoming presence. You were always the first one I introduced our student and other new employees to because you always made them feel welcomed. I'll also miss your calm demeanor during numerous crises over the past years. At least they seemed like crises at the time. I'm a bit concerned about allowing unrestricted access to the chocolate supply once you're gone. Maybe we should install a webcam so you can keep tabs on us remotely.

Enjoy and keep in touch,
Elaine

With heartfelt appreciate for your fantastic service

Eulie:

Tender my kindest compliments to your heart of hearts for the great service that you provided to us over the years at CWE. I have been here since 1987. We have been through some rough times and you have helped us in facing them gracefully. I have probably called you for help from distant shores of least four continents: India, China, Russia, Estonia, Slovenia, Italia, to name just a few. You have always been patient, resourceful, and helpful. I don't know what we will do without you.

Have a great retirement and hope you to see you from time to time.

I thought the following poem by the Nobel Prize winning Indian poet, Rabindranath Tagore, may exemplify the service that you provided us :
" Thou have made me endless, such is thy pleasure. This frail vessel thou emptiest again and again and fillest it ever withf resh life.

This little flute of a reed thou hast carried over hills and dales, and hast breathed through it melodies eternally new.

At the immortal touch of thy hands my little heart loses its limits in joy and gives birth to utterance ineffable. Thy infinite gifts come to me only on these very small hands of mine. Ages pass and still thou pourest, and still there is room to fill.”

In: Gitanjali, by Rabindranath Tagore, poem # 1 (Macmillan Publishing Company, 1913)

Subhash Basak

More time for golf!

Eulie,

Finally you've decided that you simply need more time for golf? I don't make it up to the 'toot very often any more, but I always enjoy sitting down to chat with you. I will miss our conversations and your smiling face, but I will be happy knowing you are having a fabulous retirement.

Jane

Fewer numbers, more sleeping in!

I have never been fond of virtual management, but Eulie made it possible for us to ensure we made every deadline, despite the 100-mile distance. I can guarantee that the success of the Ely field station projects would be much diminished without Eulie's constant, unyielding support. I'm not sure how you remained "pleasant" and "seemingly happy to hear from me" and "not smashing things" in the face of the last year's turmoil in the financial system -- between the two of us, at least one could remain calm and make sure proposals got submitted!

As for retirement... learn a foreign language, a musical instrument, or join a book club, but stay away from numbers. So so so many thanks for all your support and friendship.

- Euan.

Happy Retirement

Eulie, I fondly remember all of your help and good humor when I worked at NRRI and later when I invaded with my horde of students and technicians from Notre Dame. You've been a mainstay at CWE that has made the wheels turn, the grants get turned in on time, and the research done. Those who remain must be quaking in their boots when they consider getting anything done after you leave. I hope that you have a fun-filled retirement--you have earned it.

Scott Bridgham

Eulie,

What can I say, we will miss your humor and wit most of all, and "WHAT ARE THEY GOING TO DO WITHOUT YOU!" Enjoy your time of not "working", ha ha, be sure and come back to visit, often.

Sue S

Congratulations, Mom!

Wow, you really are as important and well-liked as you always say!

(Just kidding, of course!!)

I can't believe you're retiring. I remember while growing up, whenever I hit a big milestone , you would say something like, "My baby's turning 18!...it makes me feel old." Well, now I get to say, "My mom is retiring...wow, I'm getting old!"

On the positive side - more time for babysitting!!

It's been fun to read all the posts from your friends and associates. I'm sure you'll be missed deeply. Enjoy your last two weeks!

Love, Dan

Congratulations Eulie on a well deserved retirement. Our jobs at CWE were made easier because you took the responsibility to make sure all the details were covered- budgets, paperwork. scheduling etc. All of those things that most of us did not want to deal with. Also, thanks for being there to answer questions and be the go to person for the many folks on our field crews over the years and all the students that passed through CWE over the years. I know that your golf game will get the attention that it deserves now-- Enjoy. JoAnn Hanowski (enjoying being mostly retired in Vermont).

Dear Eulie,

All the best in your retirement! I don't get up Duluth-way often enough these days, but, whenever I think of NRRI, you're always present in the picture. What a big change this will be! Thanks for all the help you gave me and taking interest in my life all those years ago when I was a wee-young master's student. You will be missed!

Lisa Schulte
Ames, Iowa

Ten thousand flowers in spring
the moon in autumn,
a cool breeze in summer,
snow in winter.
If your mind isn't clouded by unnecessary things,
this is the best season of your life.
— Wu-men

Don't you stay at home of evenings?
Don't you love a cushioned seat
In a corner, by the fireside, with your slippers on your feet?
— Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr

May you always have work for your hands to do.
May your pockets hold always a coin or two.
May the sun shine bright on your windowpane.
May the rainbow be certain to follow each rain.
May the hand of a friend always be near you.
And may God fill your heart with gladness to cheer you.
— Irish Retirement Blessing

Eulie,

I must re-iterate some of the above/below sentiment: Now what am I going to do? Who will be my companion on my budget number journey through the Netherworlds?

Most important, did we mention "patience"? Your heroic effort dealing with pesky 'ol GIS lab billing, etc. will be forever recorded in the "Patient Leaders of The Last Two Decades" (2nd revision) report currently under review.

Good luck in retirement. You will be missed.










Paul M.

Eulie:

I can't even imagine NRRI without your smiling face! We both arrived here in 1988 to begin our journey. The 4th floor was a vast, mostly empty space. Remember the CPT computer system with it's huge dual-floppy drives?? ARGH..... Well, you are on your way to another journey, into retirement. Please know that you WILL be missed, and how much we all appreciated working with you! Enjoy your new ventures, and come back to visit us now and again!

Sue Hendrickson

Congratulations!

Eulie,

Its hard to image CWE without you. You will be greatly missed. I've always appreciated your help, professionalism, good humor, and of course the candy bowl on your desk. Is that still there?

Best wishes for a well deserved retirement,

Mark White

ps-maybe you could do a revised edition of the single-malt scotch muffin meeting?

Eulie,

The time I have had to work with you has been a pleasure. I greatly appreciate your willingness to help me while I was learning who everyone was on the 4th floor. You were always so willing to help with everything from conference rooms to EFS questions, thank you, I will miss your bright personality! Hopefully we will still see you from time to time when you come to visit?

Enjoy your retirement!

~Melissa Goodreau

Eulie,
Congratulations on your retirement! I had no idea you were even close to retirement. Probably because you brought such a youthful enthusiasm to NRRI. The institute will miss you in so many ways. But don't let that stop you from enjoying yourself in the coming years. It was a pleasure...
Nathan De Jager

Congratulations and Thanks!

Dear Eulie:
Congratulations on your upcoming retirement. I know you will be missed within NRRI, but I will miss you too. Thanks for your help to me in various interactions with the NRRI staff. You have really been a professional voice (to me) on the phone, but more importantly, you have been interested, understanding, kind and so very very helpful. I have enjoyed knowing you from afar. And I know that you have been very helpful to my husband, Glenn, as well. To me, you have been the voice and soul of NRRI!

Best wishes for health, happiness, and adventure in your new career. When I see you next, I hope you are going to relate some fun activities and happy experience in retirement!

Best wishes always,
Jan Keough

Eulie:

I can't imagine coming up to NRRI in a complete panic and NOT having you there to give me candy, tell me stories, commiserate about this and that, and calmly work your way through all the paperwork involved in submitting those crazy grants - and all at the last minute as well! At least I can probably count on bumping into you walking in Bagley now and then. I hope you have a very relaxing time AWAY from the big concrete box! 

You WILL be missed.

Cindy Hagley

Who will calm the graduate students and lead them through the bureaucratic maze?

I would have been lost without you Eulie, and I watched you help many other young scientist navigate the university system. I know they all appreciated your help.

Thanks very very much. Happy gardening and golfing !!!!

- Tom H.

Now what are we going to do?

Eulie's graceful professionalism has made the crazed world of SPA manageable for so many of us - she's always on top of everything that's going on.

It was before my time, but just in case no one else brings it up - how can you replace someone that would present a muffin meeting on single-malt scotch?

-Terry

Long Ago and Far Away...

Jedi Master of EGMS, Eulie is. Miss her, we will.

Your friend,
Yoda

It's not really happening is it?

One way of illustrating Eulie's importance to CWE and NRRI is that I think we all really know how much she has done to make this sealed concrete box a warm, caring, friendly, productive, and respected place to spend so many hours of our lives. It really makes me chuckle to think of all the shared experiences I have with Eulie - the last minute deadlines, the 4th floor hot and cold flashes, the odors, the elevator, the vetoes, the awards, the "we regret to .... not-fundeds", field vehicles, CUFS, EGMS, Fastlane, PeopleSoft, SPA, WOW proposals, Apprise, service contracts, vouchers, effort, budgets, computers, software, my FAX-dyslexia, caring for students and staff, parenting advice over my entire life as a parent, ... It's been a pleasure.

Rich Axler

Who will supply the chocolate?

Well folks, we have a desperate situation to deal with once Eulie retires.... When I am having a choco-holic attack, I can always count on Eulie's candy dish to have something! And, I just have to ask.... Is anyone else impressed (and slightly frightened) by the fact that Eulie ALWAYS has an answer for everything? She sure made my job easier.

I'll miss you, Eulie! ~ June

Your Outstanding Service Award Nomination Letter

Dear Eulie;

I thought I would post the text of the nomination letter for the Outstanding Service Award that you received this week. This letter was composed by the scientists in CWE.


Re: Nomination of Eulalie (Eulie) Markham for Outstanding Service Award

Dear Committee:

It is with great pleasure that we in the Center for Water and Environment at the Natural Resources Research Institute nominate Eulie Markham for a Distinguished Service Award.

Eulie has been a central figure in the Center for Water and the Environment since she began working with us in 1988. As the first face and voice that our guests encounter, Eulie presents a professional and competent attitude with unfailing courtesy that never fails to impress and reassure. But beyond that first impression Eulie also fills many essential roles for our Center and does so with incredible dedication. Former staff and especially students remark that Eulie was as much a sounding board and good listener as she was a competent and efficient staff member. (One former student remarked that she thought that “Eulie ran the place”, having never had contact with CWE Administrators!). Eulie makes new students and staff feels welcome as she efficiently helps them settle in. Her calming influence has played an important role in reassuring many a student in the throes of preparing for their thesis defense and seminar. Many of these students still maintain contact with Eulie - a tribute to her kindness. Staff comment that she cares about (and takes care of) us professionally, but she also cares about our families and our lives outside of work. But Eulie is best known over the years for her ability to multi-task with ease and efficiency.

Let us give you an impression of “a day in her life”: Eulie is at her desk by 7:30 am, if not earlier, each day. In a typical busy day she prepares one or more proposal budgets for the 10 principal investigators (PIs) in the Center, working with Sponsored Projects Administration (SPA) and the PI to sort out the details of budget forms, which differ for each of the dozen or so funding agencies with whom we work. Typical budgets take three to five iterations to ensure that the total is within the agency’s limit, the appropriate match requirements are met and calculated correctly, and the PI follows SPA regulations for allowable expenses. In between these budget revisions, Eulie answers the phone, directs callers to the appropriate person or department (no mean feat, given the breadth of CWE’s scientific and technical reach), catches up on e-card documents, reassures a student that their time sheet was signed and they will indeed be paid on time, schedules a seminar, processes a travel document, answers a PI’s questions about effort, demonstrates a procedure in the new accounting system for a staff member from another department, and on and on... Oh, and we forgot to mention that she arranged parties for staff retiring and leaving for other positions, and arranged for a card and gift for a staff member who lost a parent. That’s just another day or two for Eulie.

Our group is largely funded through external grants, and as a result, we write and submit more proposals per capita than any other department on campus. In the last two months, for example, our group has submitted 1 major grant to the US EPA STAR program (~$500K), 1 to US EPA Region 5 ($~350K), 4 proposals to LCCMR ($500K + ), 1 to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (~$226K), 1 to MPCA (~$358K), 2 to Minnesota DNR (~$60K), 3 to Minnesota’s Lake Superior Coastal Program ($46K + ~$100K + $60K), 1 to Minnesota Sea Grant (~$200K), 1 to the Northeast-Midwest Institute (~$65K)... you get the picture. We have never added up the total number of grant proposals Eulie has helped to process, but the total dollar value of those grants over her 20 years of service likely exceeds $50-60M! Members of the SPA team that work with her say “It's wonderful working with Eulie. She always tries to make our job easier - and thanks to her knowledge, skill, attention to detail, and great judgment, she succeeds. She is responsive, patient, and gracious. Plus, her sense of humor stays intact under deadline pressure.” And “From a NRRI Central Administration financial standpoint, Eulie is and has been a very much needed and appreciated resource. Whether it be on proposals, budgets, procurement cards, travel, etc., she has been our go-to person within CWE. For the amount of staff that she prepares documents for, she has a memory like a "steel trap". The scientists in CWE seem to get involved in "unique situations" whereby different avenues need to be explored on how to process, yet stay compliant, documentation. Eulie seems to have a sense about her of recognizing issues that could be problematic and works to get these resolved in the beginning of the task on hand. Her willingness to go the extra mile is always apparent. She is a joy to work with on a daily basis!”

It is no exaggeration to say that our Center’s success is dependent upon the hard work and dedication that Eulie and her colleagues in the office do collectively to ensure that the submitted product is accurate, professionally packaged, and submitted on time. When, despite everyone’s best intentions, the final disposition of a proposal gets “down to the wire”, Eulie’s calm attitude and her refusal to become flustered ensures that the package gets “in the mail”, even if it means staying late. Her supervisor, Lucinda Johnson, has received numerous comments voicing gratitude for Eulie’s dedication in assisting with this difficult and stressful process. In fact, a former researcher who moved to campus continues to ask for assistance from our office staff, especially Eulie, when it comes to submitting grant proposals. Dr. Gerald Niemi, the former Director of the Center for Water and the Environment said “Eulie Markham is one of the most dedicated, dependable, and hard working individuals that I have ever worked with – inside or outside the University. She is a real gem and has been an essential person in helping me effectively and efficiently manage millions of research dollars at NRRI. If she retires, I am breathless on how she can be replaced.”

As we begin to consider what our lives will be like following Eulie’s retirement this coming June (a very scary thought, indeed), we are beginning to mentally draft the job description. The ad might read something like ”Seeking an professional, courteous, dedicated, and highly experienced individual willing to work long hours under stress and still maintain a smile; must be able to multi-task and respond to at least two dozen ‘bosses’ at once; must be a sympathetic and good listener; excellent organizational skills required.” In other words, we need a Mary Poppins with computer and accounting skills who believes as whole-heartedly in our mission (economically and environmentally sustainable resource development) as she does. Eulie will be a very difficult employee to replace, and we will miss her sorely. To that end, we collectively wish to endorse her nomination for a Distinguished Service Award for 2008. We feel there is no more deserving individual than Eulie Markham; further, this would be a fitting reward for her 20+ years of service to NRRI and UMD.

Respectfully submitted,


Center for Water and the Environment Researchers and Staff

Dear Eulie;

Congratulations on your retirement!!! You've been such as huge part of CWE's "family" for so long. It's hard to imagine what it will be like to arrive at the office and not see you at your desk. We have been through ups and downs--- I know that I have come out the other end as a wiser and better human being for having had you as a colleague. I hope you feel the same.

Thank you so much for your long and dedicated service to CWE. I can say without a shred of doubt that had it not been for your dedication, CWE would not gotten out many of the grants we managed to squeek through! Thank you for hanging on through those tense times!

I will miss you sorely, and hope your life in retirement will be full of walks with friends and dogs, golf, and fulfilling time with your grandchildren. I hope you stay in touch.

Lucinda

Congratulations, Eulie!

Eulie, congratulations on your retirement! I was thinking back to when I started here - that was 1989, CWE lived on the 3rd floor, and I was really excited to get an 80386-based computer! We've sure come a long way since then, even though that computer is probably sitting in the CWE storeroom somewhere...

It's been such a pleasure working with you all these years - I appreciate your patience, and your good humor, and ...did I say patience? Thanks, and best wishes in your retirement - enjoy!

George