James E. Christenson ’57: A Family on the Move
Immediately after graduation, I left for my first duty station as a Navy Civil Engineer Corps officer. During a 20-year career in the U.S. Navy, we moved nine times, an average of 7,000 miles per move. Following that, during 1978-79, my wife, our three children, and I traveled throughout Europe in a VW camper for 11 months, a total of 30,000 miles. During the next 21 years, I worked as the director of facilities management for four universities: the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire, the University of Rochester, NY, the University of Iowa, and for the last nine years, the University of Michigan, where I led a staff of 1,300 people.
This photo of our family was taken in 2015; since then four spouses and four great-grandchildren have been added to our family.
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