The alumnus, who points out that his birth year, 1906, is the same as that of the co-op program, says, "I had two weeks of class, then two weeks of co-op. I had to remember which days were for school or work. Later on, it changed to a four-week cycle.”

Brant's first co-op assignment was at Peters Cartridge Co. in Kings Mills, Ohio, close to his Lebanon home. Since he didn't have a car at the time, he car-pooled to the job from home with other Peters employees who lived nearby.

"I worked in the machine shop for the first year and then in the drafting room,” he says. "I learned drafting as a co-op. Peters manufactured small arms ammunition, .22- and .32-caliber and shotgun shells, and when they had a new type of ammunition, we'd make the mechanical drawings for it.”

When a drawing was complete, the draftsman lettered the name of the item on the page, usually with an instrument he made himself. "We had to sharpen a drafting pen and grind off the tip,” he explains, "so it was slanted enough to do the lettering.”

The experience at Peters would prove useful during World War II when Brant was involved in developing equipment for shell loading .20-caliber weapons, mortars, artillery, bazookas and bombs at an Army ammunition factory in Milan, Tenn.

As a sophomore at UC, the Lebanon native joined Beta Kappa and moved into the fraternity house on Ludlow Avenue. No more breakfasts or suppers with Mrs. Sponsel's family, where room and board cost $125 per quarter, or $75 for the summer session.

"We usually ate lunch at a place on Calhoun near Clifton,” he says. "The owner's name was Charlie, and his prices suited our budget -- 30 cents for a sandwich, soup and oyster crackers.”

At that time, co-ops had a full class schedule on weekdays, plus Saturday mornings. Because Dean Schneider wanted students to have a daytime break from books, Brant spent his "hobby hour” pitching horseshoes and earned an academic credit for it. Later on, he made the campus rifle team.

Another co-op assignment was at Cincinnati Grinders, which eventually became part of Cincinnati Milling Machine. When the Great Depression hit, however, co-op jobs vanished. Brant resigned himself to attending classes full time until graduation.

Professional jobs were far from plentiful when he graduated in 1930, but Brant was hired by the American Can Co. as one of about 60 draftsmen. He remembers that when a drawing was finished, a team of eight women would carefully trace every line on starched linen cloth. Perhaps because he had met the future Mrs. Brant, one of the "tracing ladies,” the engineer says he became "disenchanted” with a draftsman's salary and decided to make a change.

A few years later, Brant began what would prove to be a long and successful career as an engineer with Procter & Gamble. He headed to his first day of work in February 1937, just days after a historic flood covered 12,000 square miles of the Ohio Valley. The deluge had begun to recede, but when he approached the P&G offices, water still lapped at the front entrance, and he had to search for an unimpeded side door.

In retrospect, the longtime UC booster -- who still attends Bearcat football and basketball games -- confirms that he enjoyed his co-op experience and would recommend it for all students.

"Because of co-op, I had something more to offer employers than the average graduate,” Brant says. "Co-op exposes students to the real world, which is something that a purely academic program can't do. I benefited from a great education at the University of Cincinnati.”