A Tribute to James W. Rouse
by Michael McCall

Jim Rouse, a man who had immeasurable impact on urban America during the last half of the twentieth century, had tremendous impact on my work for a decade, and my life forever.

Jim lived many lives in his 81 years, and volumes have been written about the man and his impact on our urban society. The writings typically recount how Jim gave birth in 1958 to the first enclosed, climate-controlled "mall" (a term he coined) built in the United States; how he regenerated downtowns; how in 1967 he built the new town of Columbia, Maryland, where nearly 100,000 people live and where I have lived and worked for 20 years; how he has helped dilapidated neighborhoods across the country rebuild well over 100,000 houses into fit and livable homes; and, how he has received this accolade or that award, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor our country bestows.

All these facts and facets of Jim's life are exceedingly more important than my story, but they have been told. This is my brief, personal tribute to a man who helped me and taught me more than I fully appreciated while I knew him. I only wish I could thank him now.

As a Midwestern young man, I had the chance to move to the east coast and work for James Wilson Rouse. In the wake of the tremendous success of Jim's "Festival Marketplaces" (Faneuil Hall in Boston and Harborplace Baltimore), and his appearance on the cover of Time magazine, he assembled a seasoned cadre of Rouse Company alums to The Enterprise Development Company, which was owned by The Enterprise Foundation. Both Enterprises were started after he retired from the day-to-day responsibilities of running the publicly traded company that bore his name. Underneath this senior management, a younger generation of over achievers assembled for the privilege to train under the master.

Though I knew that I had the honor of working for an important American figure, and the developer of the time, if I was to have a good working relationship with Jim, I felt that it was important to not fawn over him. I will never forget nervously choosing, during the first few days in his employ, to call him "Jim," when so many called him "Mr. Rouse."

I soon learned, a hundred times over, that this man lived in a far higher plane, where constructs such as title were of little value. Walking into an impressive world headquarters or marble clad seat of political power, Jim would cheerfully go out of his way to brighten up the day of the lowest ranking person, introducing himself to the security guard or janitor while on the way to the CEO or governor, with no trace of pretense or self-importance. "Hello, I'm Jim Rouse," he would simply say. Of course many of these people did not know who Jim Rouse was. I remember asking myself more than once why he even bothered. Did he really think that everyone knew who he was?

In that shallow question I missed the point, but eventually learned the lesson. Jim Rouse did not care about people knowing that many considered him to be important. Jim Rouse treated everyone with pure and fundamental dignity. His simple acts, founded in elegant truths, had infinitely powerful results.

Lessons are something Jim exuded, as he taught constantly, sometimes overtly, and always, by example. I think Jim was aware that we were to be his last group of students to matriculate into his high level form of on the job training for life. Like a narrator who provides exposition during the play, he often paused during the day to provide an enlightened perspective.

He told us to pay attention to people's "yearnings" which are many times silent, even unconscious, but nonetheless powerful forces to be fulfilled. Ever the optimist with a big brimming smile, he seemed to almost embrace adversity, often telling us, "that when life gives you lemons, make lemonade." He taught us to always start by envisioning the way something should be.

Jim was not an idealist, but a very smart realist. Jim was very wise about the psychological and sociological process that shapes results. He knew that big ideas inspire, and that most assuredly, "...reality will compromise us soon enough." According to Jim, "People will rise to the big and dramatically good plans - they will yawn at the timid, the cautious, the unconvincing." As I quote Jim Rouse today, Jim would often quote Daniel Burnham, the great American, turn-of-the-century architect, famous for saying, "Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men's blood and probably themselves will not be realized." Jim lived by this strategy for accomplishment, and accomplish he did.

"Without vision, there is no power," he admonished. "By building an image of the possible, we not only leap over a lot of roadblocks that would defeat us, we also generate a whole new constituency of people who want to see that image realized...For many years I have lived and worked with the conviction that what ought to be, can be, with the will to make it so..." Jim articulated this philosophy of empowerment so many ways over so many days that it must have sunk in; as, Strategic Leisure is driven by making so, what should, indeed, be.

Emerging decades earlier from simple beginnings on Maryland's Eastern Shore, by the time I met Jim, this lawyer, mortgage banker, suburban green-field developer and urban renewal savior had already become successful in so many ways.

Ironic it seemed to me then, that Jim was so philosophically detached about money. Now, with the benefit of middle age insight, I see that it was the very philosophy of this Christian Deepak Chopra of development, which fueled Jim's business success. He said, "Profit is a reward for important service well-rendered, and not the legitimate purpose of business in its own right. It is when the bottom line is made the top line...that business gets mixed up, off the track, loses its way. The way to find new opportunities is to discover needs or yearnings of people that are not being satisfactorily met. The way to prosper is to do that well."

However, he also respected the role of profit as the internal discipline of private sector sustenance, saying, "Profit resists the pull towards sentimentality, sophistication and arrogance. It hauls dreams into focus and leads to bone and muscle solution."

In 1982, at age 25, I started working for Jim, as he was in the very vigorous twilight of his career. It was a study in contrasts. Naturally, Jim was at the center of my professional universe; obviously, I was a single star in his big sky. I wanted to get rich; Jim was rich and wanted to give his wealth away. In an attempt to be bold I was sometimes brash; Jim was ever the consummate diplomat. I liked high concept entertainment (it was the eighties); Jim liked "authentic" casual, unstructured entertainment. And so it went.

What we shared was passion for what we believed; which meant that we often disagreed and debated. What is remarkable to me is that he allowed me to so vocally disagree, to challenge his far more experienced point of view. In retrospect, I am amazed that I was not fired on any number of occasions. However, just as he gave us permission to fail, so long as we tried our best and learned from our mistakes, Jim allowed my outspoken passion, backed up by consideration and intellect. Thankfully, he lived by what he espoused: that sandwiched between the goals of serving the communities in which a company worked and making a profit, the second responsibility of any enterprise was to provide growth opportunities for its employees.

I owe so much to Jim Rouse. His credibility, coattails and confidence provided me incredible opportunities to develop destinations, meet interesting people, work with extraordinary talent, fulfill my boyhood dream of working with Disney, travel the world, and follow my own instincts, which eventually led me to becoming another "Rouse sprout." In the end, more importantly than anything else, his always-positive outlook and passionate vision for a better world provided a model, not just for working, but for living. "Give yourself to purposes beyond self," he said. "Fulfillment, happiness and success are almost never found in self service and self concern."

To the man who said hundreds of times that "everything counts," you counted far more than most. Thank you, Mr. Rouse.