For students who are on the meal plan, live on Foss Hill, or just enjoy all-you-can-eat, McConaughy dining hall, or Mocon, is the place to be, and many workers do their best to make it more pleasant. One Mocon worker who can be often seen chatting with students is 51-year-old James B. Anthony.
“I know him from just going to Mocon. He makes his presence known,” said Portia Hemphill ’07. “Not only in Mocon. I was walking from the science center after class one day and he was blasting music from his car on the way to work.”
“It’s James on the job, Tony on the streets,” said Anthony of his name preference. “Originally, I’m from the Bronx, NY. I came to Connecticut twelve years ago.”
He moved from New York because of his job and his family.
“My old job in screen graphic printing closed down so I came up here. At the time, my family was already in Connecticut; they came before I did. These days I still go back out there [New York] once in a while,” Anthony said.
Anthony is married with four children. He has two sons, aged 21 and 22, and two daughters who are 19 and 18. After his arrival in Connecticut, Anthony went on to work in several other jobs before arriving at Wesleyan.
“I worked at Burger King and then I did a shipping job in Meriden,” Anthony said. “After that, I came to Wesleyan, and I’ve been working here for five straight, long, hard years.”
Anthony began as a clean-up janitor and moved to the Mocon salad bar in 1999.
“Ya know, like the Prince song. I was moved up, got a promotion,” Anthony said.
After being at Wesleyan for all these years, Anthony enjoys the work environment and the company.
“Everybody here is cool. The students are real cool, they make my day. So are the people I work with, I don’t have arguments with them,” Anthony said.
Anthony feels that it’s time for the Mocon decorations to change again.
“They should decorate this place, take that crap down [referring to the white material hung on the ceilings of Mocon]. Liven it up more, maybe add speakers and a bubble machine,” Anthony said.
Anthony, whose own favorite Mocon dish is a grilled cheese, sees workers contributing a vital part to the dining hall’s atmosphere.
“We try to liven it up for you, once in a while. After all, we’re all here to make sure you’re all satisfied,” Anthony said.
Anthony said he feels students, as well as workers, play a critical role in campus dining.
“When students step in and help us with our problems, I appreciate that,” he said. “The students come first. Personally, I’d like it if students stayed on campus to eat. You have to pay much more to eat out for the same amount of food you can eat here. [In the end], It’s the students who hold the cause. They would listen to all of you [students] before listening to [workers]; after all, your parents pay $40,000 a year to get you here.”
Should a student ever find herself alone in Mocon, Anthony is more than willing to strike up a conversation.
“I think that he’s hilarious – a very friendly, all around cool guy. Very down to earth and he never seems uptight. He tends to make the most out of his job by actually interacting with the students,” Hemphill said.
“I’m an outgoing, cheerful person. I’m willing to listen to anybody who has something to say, as long as it’s not serious,” Anthony said. “Y’all are great kids and more power to y’all.”
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