Gift to Walker Hall Recognizes First Accounting Professor

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Walton College alumna Carol Cole Eiseman and her husband Bryon, chairman and managing partner of Friday, Eldredge and Clark LLP, have pledged $350,000 toward the construction of Willard J. Walker Hall at the Sam M. Walton College of Business, University of Arkansas.

The café space in the new graduate building will be named in honor of her father, Walter B. Cole, one of the first four Walton College faculty members and the first accounting professor.

 Professor Cole joined the University of Arkansas in 1926 to help organize a department of economics and sociology, where he shared a single office with the three other faculty members of the department. Part of the newly created College of Business Administration, the department was housed in two classrooms, which often did not have lights because of lack of money for electricity. Within two years, the department offered a two-year program in business.

Cole served the College of Business Administration as an accounting professor for 43 years, a record at the time he retired in 1969. In 1970-71, he completed his teaching career as a visiting professor at San Diego State.

Walton College Dean Doyle Z. Williams said: “We are very grateful to the Eisemans for their support of this important building. The Walter B. Cole Café is fitting tribute for such an outstanding faculty member. Professor Cole left a legacy of high academic standards in the college. He was known as a fair but demanding instructor. Even after his retirement in 1969, he would walk the halls of the department, review grades posted by various instructors, and discuss high standards. Students benefited from his accounting knowledge and expectation of excellence. Many of them went on to become leaders in the business community.

“Having the Cole Café space will stimulate discussion, networking and team building,” added Williams. “Walker Hall is going to help the college advance and become more nationally competitive in graduate business education as it has become at the undergraduate level.”

Carol Eiseman, B.S.B.A. ’60, MBA ’61, said: "Since I was an only child, Dad, I think, saw all of his students as his other children. His dreams were for each of us to have a high sense of integrity and measure up to our capabilities. He enjoyed spending time after class and in his office talking to the students about problems and working out solutions. He encouraged accounting firms to offer his students jobs upon graduation.

"Some of the faculty members and students have said that it was a pleasant interlude in the day to talk with him at George's, the local coffee shop, or the Student Union,” Eiseman added. “The subjects of conversation went from sports to current events to economic indicators, such as sales, trade, manufacturing, transportation, inflation, and the stock market. Much information was shared through the individual spreadsheets, which highlighted gains and losses. Students not only learned accounting, but they also could get an overall picture of the factors involved in making financial decisions. Professor Cole, in addition to being referred to as 'Pappy,' was also considered 'a preferred companion with good humor, optimistic about everything.' When things were going wrong, he would say, 'This, too, will pass.' Through considerable reading to obtain an accurate view of the present, he was able to share with his students how better to foresee the business world of the future."

After receiving a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from Lawrence College, Appleton, Wis., in 1925 and a Master of Business Administration in accounting from the University of Illinois in 1926, Cole came to Arkansas to serve as the only accounting professor for 20 years. He was one of Arkansas' first certified public accountants, receiving a license number of 72 by the Arkansas State Board of Accountancy. He was president of the Arkansas Society of CPAs in 1951-52 and held the society’s honorary life membership. He was elected president of the Arkansas State Board of Accountancy in 1943. In 1976, an anonymous lead gift established the Walter B. Cole Chair in Accounting.

Cole chaired the accounting department from 1947 to 1957. Because accounting was the first major offered by the college, he became the leader in accounting education.

The Alpha Iota Chapter of Beta Alpha Psi, the honorary accounting fraternity committed to professionalism and community service, came to campus in 1951 under Cole’s sponsorship. The coveted membership required a high grade point. Cole also served as a faculty member of the University of Arkansas Athletic Board and faculty sponsor of the Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity.

In 1953, Cole pioneered the use of computer data processing as a teaching tool and taught the first class in data processing accounting, using an IBM 402 machine. Majors in data processing accounting have fond memories of the big black machine that filled the room; little could they guess the future use of the computer. At the time of his retirement, he felt that the greatest change that had been made in accounting was the emphasis on mathematics, which was probably due to the increased use of data processing equipment. He had also been a.

The Cole Café will be a main feature in the new Walker Hall, a graduate building made possible through a lead gift of $8 million from the Willard and Pat Walker Charitable Foundation. The building was named for the late Willard Walker, in honor of his success in retail management with Wal-Mart Stores Inc. The building will also showcase technology-enhanced teaching classrooms and student learning spaces, student team rooms, project rooms for industry partnering, a financial markets trading room and two research centers. The excavation and construction for the building began this summer. Walker Hall is being designed by Machado and Silvetti Associates Inc. of Boston and Allison Architects Inc. of Little Rock.