COMMENCEMENT 1924

This was supposed to be a story of the 1924 Commencement at Dartmouth as seen- by John J. Smith, a member of a reuning class who was in Hanover from the thirteenth to the seventeenth of June last. If this is to be taken as meaning- an account of the Commencement which was diagramed on the official program, Smith is one of the last men in the world to be chosen to essay its description. He knows nothing at all about it. He did not see it. Except for the distant music of the band, he did not hear it. For him that Commencement did not exist.

To Smith and his like there were many Commencements crowded into those few short days in June which the ridiculous almanac places among the longest in the year. There were of course as Smith says, as many separate and distinct Commencements last June as there were reuning classes, besides, as he is willing to concede, the Commencement neatly set forth on the program printed by the College. But the 1924 Commencement of Smith, the only 1924 Commencement there was, so far as his personal knowledge goes, had its end, its beginning and its entirety in seventy-two hours of continuous association with the men and women and children of his class; which class, by the way, is generally conceded, except by the parochial and vicious minded, to be the very best ever graduated from any college.

The only physical attribute the twelve or fourteen Commencements at Hanover last June had in common was the weather. This being the only phase of Commencement of general interest of which Smith has knowledge it is necessary, if he is to make any contribution to history on the topic assigned, to set forth his views as a meteorologist. Smith, who at any time would rather spend a week in Hanover during daily cloudbursts than a month in any other place which is swept by balmy breezes and bathed in sunshine, says that rain in Hanover even heavy rain always seems more cheerful, less damp, than anywhere else in the world, with the obvious advantage at Commencement in a reunion year of tending to drive reuning classmates indoors and hence even closer together. In the past, it is true, in years when his class was not reuning, he has sometimes felt that the official of the United States Weather Bureau in particular charge of allocating weather for Grafton County during Commencement time has taken too literally the pronouncement of the Dartmouth Hovey that: "It's always fair weather when good fellows get together." It has seemed at times that after distributing his choicest stock elsewhere the weather man has dumped his shop worn remnants in the vicinity of Hanover in the flattering belief that mere weather can make no difference one way or the other when a crowd of Dartmouth men are back together in the old home town. This year, although it rained fluently Friday night and showered with sincerity Saturday noon, the rest of the time the weather was one hundred percent Volstead. Never, it seemed to Smith, did makebelieve, harmless, cotton wool clouds hang in a bluer sky than on Sunday and Monday, never did the; sunlight filter through the trees more beautiful tapestry figures on the campus lawn, never did the cordon of hills that surround and guard the town walk in greater beauty and grace. To make a long story short the weather was fine.

Even if the columns of the ALUMNI MAGAZINE welcomed a description of the personal Commencement of Smith last June, such common things as words which can be bought for money by the dictionary full at any bookshop are too gross a medium for the expression of what the 1924 Commencement meant to him. He might try to tell of the picnics and games, and suppers and dinners on the reunion program; of the renewal of old time friendships by personal contact and their strengthening; of the exchange of matured opinions between men gathered from near and far, who long ago as boys and all together in a single village had matched youthful views on everything under the sun; of the long watches of the night when men softly spoke their love, their love of Dartmouth, and were the better for having done so; of the retelling of old stories and the reawakening of old memories which took away all the veneer that the world had given him and made him again the young knight who on another Commencement Day went forth, to joust with the world for the honor of his Liege Lady of Dartmouth. But there are thoughts too dear, sentiments too pure, ideals too vivid to be shouted in a public place. The reunion was to Smith, as class reunions always are, a spiritual reawakening; and all he really would be able to tell you is that he is a better class man, a better Dartmouth man, a better man because of it.

Having failed to obtain from the sentimentalist Smith any account of the 1924 Commencement which is of the slightest value to the great body of readers of the ALUMNI MAGAZINE, and finding him incoherent except for a lengthy rhapsody on the weather, the few facts as to which appeared much more accurately in the daily press, it was necessary to resort to Robert R. Robinson who was in attendance during Commencement although not a member of a reuning class. Robinson in general approved of the 1924 Commencement although it seemed to him that there was not so much going on, not quite so much pep or heart throb as at other Commencements he had attended. Upon inquiry it appeared that these other Commencements coincided with reunions of Robinson's own class which he is prepared to demonstrate by facts, figures, charts and blueprints to anyone not feeble-minded or narrower than the thin end of a shingle to be the greatest class that ever graduated from any college.

But Robinson managed to find a lonesome half dozen of the Grand Old Class in town and they conscientiously attended most of the ceremonials and festivities on the program. Now that it is all over his mind does not readily recall detail but he is conscious of a pleasing and lasting general effect. As an accurate observer he was blurred by crowding memories of his own days in college and as a fair commentator he suffers from a sneaking idea that the way things used to be done was about the right way to do them. So, it will be seen, he is far from being a typical alumnus.

He did not succeed in getting into the meetings of Alumni Council but did seek out a councillor from his district for a report of the proceedings of the managers of the ever growing business of the Dartmouth Alumni body. As usual the proceedings of that body last June illustrate the dual relation of the alumni on the one hand to the undergraduate body on the other to the administration of the College. For at the Commencement meeting the Council not only devoted considerable time to a presentation of the undergraduate situation by R. M. Morgan '24, President of the Outing Club and member of Palaeopitus, but also allocated the contributions to the Alumni fund for the current year, voting $5,000 to reduce the principal of the mortgage on the gymnasium, adding $1,000 to the William Jewett Tucker Scholarship and dividing the balance between the deficit in the current expenses of the College and the College Endowment Fund. Then too on Friday night President Hopkins sat down at dinner with the Council and there around the table the Trustees and the Administration through the President of the College met face to face the alumni body through its' duly elected representatives. It pleased Robinson to think that all of Dartmouth was there in that room to discuss in an intimate way the problems and the aspirations of the College.

Robinson thoroughly enjoyed the Class Day exercises on Saturday. In competition with the small boys of the town he skipped along beside the band and as near to it as he could get. It was in name the same band that led the procession some twenty odd years before when Robinson wore a cap and gown. The personnel of the band as well as of the delegation of small townies seemed to Robinson identically the same, unchanged by Time, but the seniors to him looked younger, more boyish, less mature than Robinsoffs Class on its Commencement Day although the average age of the graduating class as published was slightly higher than the average age of his own classmates at their Commencement. But the thoughts expressed by the youthful Class Day speakers seemed to the rejuvenated Robinson to differ little in age from those expressed in addresses given on his own Class Day, in both instances these being sufficiently mature. Witness Kenneth Austin Harvey's Address of Welcome:

"It becomes our duty to take an active and not a passive part in remolding faulty ideas and redirecting social currents." And James Shelp Wheaton in the Address to the College:

"To those who will make the Dartmouth of tomorrow we therefore leave this challenge: to develop through and beyond mere open-mindedness and skepticism to the higher level of intelligent convictionism and thus to achieve their highest utility 'to Society."

And Harland Cobb Stockwell in the Class Oration : "Dartmouth the voice is still calling that summoned Eleazar of old, Calling the sons of Dartmouth of a stanch heroic mould.

Calling the sons of Dartmouth to trudge through the windswept night, Perhaps to stray in the marshes but always to labor and fight."

The caution of Sachem Joseph G. Butler. whether needed or not, was grandfatherly enough for any fundamentalist: "Let Duty's fire burn bright in every breast But no fire water smoulder underneath the vest.

Let's all go nightly sober to our cots And indicate with thumb of scorn the sots."

and the theme of H. Pennington Haile in his finely wrought Class Poem: "We go with memory burning brightand yet

Life is so fast and full—we shall forget!" in its sophistication seemed to Robinson to speak from an age beyond that of the oldest living alumnus. But he got a familiar orthodox thrill from the Address to the Old Pine by Kenneth Wellman Davis:—

"Though all its physical substance may sometime pass away, the day will never come when its influence with not perpetuate those ideals for which it stands . . .

the Dartmouth Spirit, that indefinable intense something which has always inspired men of Dartmouth to great achievements."

Feeling comparatively young after the Class Day exercises Robinson ventured to steer a course for the next event, entitled on the program:—"President and Mrs. Hopkins at home," finding them however, in a large tent on the Campus. This to Robinson was a delightful innovation. He has never received Honorable Mention for the smoothness of that part of his anatomy which connects his head with his body and the locus of the affair seemed to him to reduce to a minimum the agonizing features which usually mark a formal reception. Not only did he thoroughly enjoy it, but so, too, did members of the highly civilized and aesthetic class which followed his in college, so a good time was had by all.

On Sunday morning, not being under compulsion, he went pleasantly to Rollins Chapel, where Rev. Karl Reiland of St. George's Protestant Episcopal Church, New York City, spoke words of truth and beauty on the text: "Lord I pray thee, open his eyes, that he may see," and President Hopkins in his Valedictory, reminding the seniors they would continue as postgraduates to find it true that:

"A selective process for the acceptance of ideas of worth and for the rejection of all others is as necessary to the individual mind as is a selective process for the admission of students to the individual

college." sent them away with the stimulating question:—

"Will you under the discipline of conflicting motives and amid the compelling forces of adverse conditions, maintain as your aspiration the attainment of what truth really is and how actually to conform to it?"

The rest of the day he spent in the open and among the hills. The discovery by the Dartmouth undergraduate body some time ago that it had an out of doors seems to have been coincident with the fuller appreciation by returning alumni of how much the setting of the College in the spot where it is must have had to do with her life and with the characteristics she imparts to her progeny. For Robinson saw on Sunday afternoon in numbers larger than ever before the home-come alumni in class groups and in small parties visiting the great domain of Dartmouth which lies outside the village of Hanover.

The ball game Monday morning was a delight to Robinson. Sweltering on the bleachers he matched fine plays made on the field before him with reminiscences of baseball prowess of Dartmouth men long since withdrawn from the diamond and now engaged in spirited but losing contests with baldness, rheumatism and arterio schlerosis. He picked with judicial precision an all-Dartmouth team from players of his own time which he boasted could defeat the combined Cornell and Dartmouth nines with pathetic ease. He quarreled acridly with friends seated around him as to the scores in Dartmouth games which were played before the wearers of the green in the present contest were born. He expressed at times grave doubts as to the competency and even the honesty of the umpires in several close decisions which were adverse to the Green. He was generous but firm in suggestive criticism to the Cornell players and he had a convincing alibi for any Dartmouth error. He finally went into vociferous ecstasy when Dartmouth forged ahead and victory was assured, for poor Robinson is of that low grade of sportsmanship which holds that the purpose of playing a game is to win it and he is never satisfied in a Dartmouth contest with anything but a Dartmouth victory.

At two o'clock Robinson participated in the folk moot of the Dartmouth tribe in the annual meeting of the Alumni Association. The Secretaries Association, the Alumni Council and other alumni bodies have taken over much of the deliberative and administrative work of this historic association but it is still tne repository of the tribal legislative power. So the admirable report of Judge Hough read by Prof. J. K. Lord on the revision of the method of election of alumni trustees and alumni councillors was presented, and after deliberation, received the hearty approval of the Alumni Association. Pres. M, B. Jones '94 presided, and Charles W. Pollard '95 of Omaha, Nebraska, was elected his successor.

The men of 1874 were presented to the assembly individually and delightfully by their classmate Samuel L. Powers. Their appearance indicated success in withstanding alike the ravages of Time, and of their 50th reunion. The '94 cup, awarded annually to the reuning class having in Hanover for Commencement the largest percentage of living graduate members but not including non-graduates, was won by 1874, with 71% attendance, the runners-up being 1894 with 67%, 1864 with 64%, and 1899 with 62%.

And then came Tuesday, Commencement Day of the 155 th year of the College. As early as 9 o'clock the quiet bustle incident to marshaling the annual academic procession for the exercises was manifest on the Campus. The class marshal of 1924 naturally took more time in getting his host of 350 black-gowned candidates for bachelor's degrees, into line, than did the holder of that office at the first Commencement of 1769, who needed to marshal but three classmates besides himself and his work was done. As ever, the alignment of the holders of Doctor's degrees interested Robinson, and he regretted neglected opportunities of. early life in not spending enough-years to acquire someone of the degrees which permit the wearing of a hood of the more startling hues; Finally the long line formed, circumnavigated the Campus, and packed- into Webster Hall. The marathon program of speakers which in olden days was a test of endurance for participants and audience alike is now mercifully shortened. This year there were but four speakers and their subjects, in refreshing contrast with those of old time Commencement speakers, dealt with the present or the future. Robinson speculated as to whether the change evidenced a change in the immediate object of Dartmouth education. Formerly the graduate felt that he must demonstrate that he had mastered the wisdom of the ancients, now he seeks to show a recognition of present day problems and a willingness to help in their solution. The classical programs of thirty or more years ago did not read like this one:—

Retrospect and Hope, Charles Anthony Knudson, Jr.

The Race Problem, Shepard Holden Patterson.

Slaughter as a Means to Progress, Albert Emerson Hadlock, Jr.

The Younger Generation Grows Older, William Alden Gardner.

This year the Colloge honored ten men with honorary degree. The admirable presentations by Prof. Keir and the finely chosen, pregnant words of President Hopkins in the bestowal of the honors appear elsewhere in the MAGAZINE.

What used to be called the Alumni Dinner on Commencement Day, but was really a luncheon, is now called a Luncheon though it is just as much a dinner it ever was. Since arriving. in Hanover Robinson had taken an eclectic course in dining establishments... He had gone and got it downstairs at the Commons and had it brought to him upstairs; he had diagnosed the epidemic of cafes. esoterically named but prosaically bill-of-fared,-which has-broken out down the. length of Main Street and, mirabile dictu, he had actually eaten at the Inn during Commencement time, an honor long coveted but not expected until his fiftieth reunion. This was due, of course, to the opening of the commodious, well-appointed dining room made possible by the beautiful new addition to the Inn.

As ever, the collation for the alumni at noon on Commencement Day manifested joy that the labor of bringing forth a new class into the alumni world was over. It had a little bit of sadness to Robinson as it ever does, for it was for him the end of three days of pure delight in sunlit Arcady, in the homeland of his heart, and departure into the comparative darkness of the world was too near. Again the illustrious class of '74 was rightly honored.

Mr. Powers told of the graduation suits made under a joint contract for his clamates fifty years ago, by a tailor named Carpenter. He praised the garments most eloquently as to cut and texture and especially as to the wearing qualities. Some of the youthful modernist tailor-made men at the luncheon were prepared to scoff and to query as to whether Mr.

Powers should not rather have designated the builder of the suits as a carpenter named Taylor. But he silenced all criticism and aroused admiration and envy when he triumphantly led forth his classmate Elgin A. Jones actually wearing his Commencement suit of fifty years ago. President Hopkins gave a report of the year just ended and the other speakers were Ambassador Jusserand, General Currie, principal of McGill, Dean Woodbridge of Columbia and Ernest L. Silver '99, principal of the Plymouth Normal School, all recipients of honorary degrees.

All the details of the events set forth in the 1924 Commencement program so far as they can be gleaned from Mr. Robinson have been set forth, and, scanty as they are, they must suffice. Anyway this was supposed to be a story of the 1924 Commencement as seen by John J. Smith, a member of a reuning class, and all he saw of it was the weather.

Seniors returning from the Old Pine

At the Class Day Exercises

Reunion classes watching the Ball Game from the Senior Fence

President Hopkins and Ambassador Jusserand in the Procession

The time-honored costume of the five-year class