It was a bright sunshiny day at the “brand new” Beaver Stadium on June 11th, 1960. My better half Helen and I were part of that year's graduating class. We were cocksure we would and could, solve all of the problems of the world. However, our commencement speaker was the President of the University, Dr. Eric Walker who proceeded to verbally “slap us upside the head” with words of wisdom that remain imprinted on my psyche to this day. Let me pass on Dr. Walker's insight and advice to members of the new graduating classes of 2015.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the Class of 1960.” He stated with a slight hint of the British accent that remained in his speech pattern despite thirty plus years as a newly minted American.
Dr Walker was an extraordinarily person. He was born in England in 1910. He received his B.S. In engineering in 1932, his M.B.A. In 1933, and his D. Sc in 1935 - all from Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. As president of the University he had installed a policy at Penn State that had no exceptions allowed. No one would be allowed to graduate before passing a written English proficiency examination at the end of their Junior Year. You could be a Dean's List student in Engineering Science but if you didn't pass that exam you weren't getting a P.S.U. Sheepskin on Graduation Day.
Since I had flunked Freshman English, the probability of flunking the Junior Proficiency Exam was a distinct possibility so an S.O.S. was put out for an English tutor. A French major named Helen Stahl answered the distress call and successfully prepared me for the
exam. A year later Helen and I both graduated with noses sun burned during the commencement ceremony. We both looked like Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer as we walked down the isle of the Eisenhower Chapel as the third couple to be married that afternoon on campus. After a wedding reception at the Nittany Lion Inn we both went forward to enjoy rewarding careers but remembering the words of Dr Walker as our guiding beacon along the way.
It's that time of the year to pass the baton to freshly minted high school and college graduates. Our advice is to go back and read the fifty five year old words of Dr Walker. I'd also like to add a special thanks to all those graduates who, through R.O.T.C., the military academies, or enlistment tours, are about to man the ramparts against the bad guys out there who want to hurt my family, friends, and me. Bad people are forever there, and no amount of wishful thinking will rid us of them. You're the Thin Red Line that will do it and I thank you in advance for your service.
* Stratton Schaeffer is a retired consulting engineer and farmer who lives on Joe Hill.