The Fifty-Tear Address

President Guy C. Richards '96 Speaks for Honored Class At General Alumni Meeting of Commencement Week End

OUR CLASS came into its college birthright at the close of the administration of Samuel Colcord Bartlett that marked the end of a long era which extended for nearly a century and a quarter from the beginnings of the College through the university episode and eight administrations and came to be known and referred to as the old Dartmouth.

Now we return in observance of the fiftieth anniversary of our graduation at the close of another equally important period which included the inauguration of the new Dartmouth under William Jewett Tucker in our time and its remarkable progress under the administrations of Doctor Tucker and Ernest Martin Hopkins.

Opportunity for great service waits upon him on whose shoulders falls the mantle of his distinguished predecessors. Those of us who chanced to hear President Dickey speak at the Boston dinner are looking forward to the success of his program to educate graduates of Dartmouth for strong community leadership to fill the need for such leadership in our land and for the assurance of the establishment and maintenance of a just and lasting peace in the whole world.

We who came here at one critical time in the history of our beloved College salute the new leader who comes at the time of another crisis to carry on the work of his office and on the occasion of this customary official recognition of our alumni status extend to him our best wishes and our promise of support of his administration. May the hand of our Almighty Father lead him and guide his footsteps in his great task.

At the time of our entry here we found a campus which served as the scene of all athletic activities and college buildings composed largely of the original Dartmouth Hall and its fellow group in the college row, the church and chapel, a library and an outgrown and outmoded gymnasium. The College had a small and excellent faculty, increased in our time, and a gradually revised and expanding course of study under a program that might be described as socialization in this day and age.

1896 GRADUATES NUMBERED 56

Fifty-six men of our class were graduated, the smallest number during a period beginning nearly thirty years before our graduation and continuing to the present time. The class members though small in number made a good record of achievement. We had excellent scholars and also did our fair share in the field of athletics and in the matter of college chores. I speak of Stephen Chase of the well-known Hanover Chases, the greatest Dartmouth athlete of our time, whose long legs brought to the College the world championship in the high hurdles. I remember that Steve running for the New York Athletic Club against a British team on a cinder track took the measure of the champion Englishman who told him that he could have beaten him on turf, so Steve arranged to meet him on turf in New York and again was the winner.

One of our members, Doctor William Madison Gay, a medical major in the American Expeditionary Forces of World War I, was cited for gallantry on the field of battle by the Republic of France at the age of forty five and after further years of military service lies sleeping in the hallowed ground of the American soldier on the heights of Arlington.

In the world at large we have had able and successful men in all the professions and in business and some of them have become leaders of the type visualized in our new college program.

We have judge Louis Cox whose long and distinguished service in the higher Massachusetts courts and his delegation to the particular task has resulted in many changes and reforms for the betterment of court procedure and the reduction of trial congestion. He is one of three brothers, Guy 1893, Louis 1896, and Channing 1901, all of whom have brought honor to Dartmouth.

There is Byron Eldred who received Dartmouth's degree of Doctor of Science at time of our twentieth reunion and has been head of the New York Engineers. He became expert in scientific research and has been the author or producer of many important and successful inventions that have benefited daily American life.

Benjamin Warren Couch, lawyer, banker and public servant, recently lost to our sight but always living in our hearts, was awarded an honorary degree five years ago by President Hopkins in express recogni- tion of his exemplification of the kind of citizenship which makes this country strong by quiet and unassuming contributions of needful thought and effort to the welfare of the whole community.

One of our non-graduates, who has so developed his life that he has taught and lectured in many colleges and universities has been awarded the Pulitzer Prize four times and has been honored by the conferring of many doctorates including that of Dartmouth where he now belongs to the peripatetic portion of our teaching force in the capacity of George Ticknor Fellow in the Humanities, is the universally recognized foremost American poet of our time, Robert Frost.

CRAVEN LAYCOCK REMEMBERED

There is one more of whom I would particularly speak. His career is in the top row and has always filled us with pride and his class fellowship was our joy. For eulogy I quote a portion of the prayer offered by Bishop Dallas at the service in Rollins Chapel:

"Eternal Father, let us thank Thee for Craven Laycock—for the humor which sparkled in his eye and which put gentleness on his tongue, for the fearlessness with which he met boys, not yet made men, for the depth of his religion which would not let him speak too boldly of The Way, The Truth and The Life, for his appreciation of hard work, for his loyalty to those with whom he worked, for his devotion to Dartmouth in Hanover, and to Dartmouth at the ends of the earth, for his gift of speech with which he stirred the souls of men, and for his faith in youth."

For a brief peroration I make use of the closing words of President Tripp of the Class of 1876 in his address twenty years ago when I presided at the association meeting and began to look forward to this day and hour:

"The last years the reaper has been busy, and our meeting is tinged with sadness as We miss the ones we held so dear. It remains for us the living to hold in fond memory those who have passed on, to preserve the class traditions, to meet with all that we can gather of the living members of the class, until in the future, not too far distant, the one remaining member of the class will respond to the silent call by rising with glass in hand like Colonel Newcome and responding Adsum."

PRESIDENT of the Fifty-Year Class, Guy C. Richards '96, delivers the Fifty Year Address from the rostrum of Webster Hall at the Alumni Meeting held Commencement weekend.