By Lindsay Tice,Staff Writer

LEWISTON – Bates College is losing two of its most popular and highly respected professors.

Elizabeth Tobin, 54, a history professor and special assistant to the president, is leaving Bates to serve as academic vice president at Illinois College in Jacksonville, Ill. Her husband, history professor Steve Hochstadt, 57, will go with her and teach European history at the college.

They announced their resignations in November.

“People have said, We’re happy for you but it’s sad for us’ or sad for Bates’ or sad for the community,'” Hochstadt said. “Living in Maine and working at Bates has been a dream for me, but (moving to Illinois) is a new adventure.”

The couple leaves in June.

Tobin and Hochstadt met in Germany in 1976 as they conducted research for their doctoral dissertations. She was from Chicago; he was from New York. They married in 1978 and immediately began looking for jobs.

Because history graduates had flooded the market, teaching jobs were nearly impossible to find. Bates offered both work, allowing them to share a single professorship. The couple came to Maine knowing nothing about the college and nearly nothing about Maine.

They quickly fell in love with both.

“I just enjoyed living in a small city and feeling like I could get to know people and they could get to know me,” Hochstadt said.

They moved to Lewiston, raising son Sam and daughter Mae in the city. They became involved in a number of community groups, including the Lewiston School System, the Great Falls Forum and the 2003 diversity rally.

“It’s a community where you can really play a role,” Tobin said.

At Bates, Hochstadt became a popular European history professor whose courses on the Holocaust routinely filled with more than 130 students, the classroom’s capacity. He also began conducting research for a book about Jews who left Nazi German and moved to Shanghai.

Tobin served as a history professor and in 2000 also became associate dean of faculty. Last year, she began serving as special assistant to the president and organizing a campus-wide project on culture and diversity.

Although happy at Bates, Tobin wanted to work more in administration. When Illinois College, a 176-year-old, small town liberal arts college, asked her to apply for a vice presidency, she agreed.

“The college is similar enough that I think I can be helpful, but different enough that it will present different intellectual challenges,” she said.

The move will allow Tobin to work in administration, a passion. It will allow Hochstadt to continue teaching while giving him more time to work on his book.

Although they leave in June, they aren’t ready to say good-bye quite yet. Tobin wants to complete her campus culture and diversity project. Hochstadt has one last Holocaust class to teach, and he wants to make it the best one yet.

“We’re not gone yet by a long shot,” Hochstadt said. “There’s more we want to do.”

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