The 1950 Valedictory

The valedictory on behalf of the largestgraduating class in Dartmouth's historywas delivered by Mr. Kilmarx just beforethe conferring of the Bachelor degrees atthe final exercises in the Bema on Sunday,June 11. The son of Sumner D. Kilmarx'22 of Bronxville, N. Y., he was chairmanof the Undergraduate Council, a memberof Palaeopitus, manager of the varsity football team, and a Rufus Choate Scholar.

EIGHT YEARS AGO Stubby Pearson stood in this spot and summed up his class' four years at Dartmouth in these words: "In with the hurricane—out with the war." The immediate future for the men of the class of 1942 had been largely decided for them by the war. Few felt confident enough to plan beyond it. For some, such as Stubby, the war was their whole future.

Today Dartmouth graduates another of her classes, and leaves it to face a new kind of future—a future unclouded by war, but in many respects as critical; a future of considerable opportunity and some doubt. Dartmouth has prepared us to meet that future as best she could. How we meet it is up to us. How well we meet it is a measure of what we have gained from Dartmouth.

We have been a fortunate class. We have received the benefit of four uninterrupted years of college, and we have known Dartmouth as she was meant to be known. In the span of our stay here we have seen Dartmouth at her peak. We have seen her suffer a serious set-back, and we have seen her rise again in spite of that setback. We have seen the campus under snow, mud, water, and rich green grass. We have walked across it in open collars and Dartmouth sweaters rather than in blues and officers' whites. We have received a Dartmouth education in every sense of that word. We come away the richer for it.

For four years Dartmouth has given and we have received. She has given us the opportunity to live together in a relationship that few of us will ever recreate or forget. She has given us the opportunity to experience and become a part of what we proudly know as the Dartmouth Fellowship—that spirit which binds Dartmouth men to each other and to the College, and which has manifested itself to us perhaps most plainly on such occasions as Dartmouth Night, when just being men of Dartmouth was important enough to stand in the rain and cheer about. She has given us the benefits of an academic education which Daniel Webster never dreamed of when he described Dartmouth in 1818 as "one of the lesser lights in the literary horizon of our country." She has privileged us with the leadership of a man who, by his words and actions, has indicated to us what that Dartmouth education means. She has taken many of us as boys, and has made us into men. She has given us much, and today, as we leave, it is time for us to give something in return.

We can offer little but words now, but they can be words of promise—promise to use what Dartmouth has given us to the best advantage, a promise to realize our potential. We are going out from Dartmouth into a highly complex society. The great need of that society is for responsible citizens, not necessarily men of great wisdom and maturity who can successfully resolve the world's difficulties, but thinking men of character, faith, and good will who will take seriously the difficult task of living their lives from day to day to the best of their ability, and according to the ideals they have established for themselves.

There are too many complex problems in the world for any one man or group of men to solve even a few of them. On the other hand, individual effort must be the basis of all good works—there are not so many in the world that any one can fail to do his part and not weaken the common effort. We all have a job to do no matter how great or small. Dartmouth does not expect us to blaze a path of glory through the heavens. She does expect us to accomplish what we can, and to become what we are capable of becoming. To do less is a denial of ourselves and the college that has molded us. To do less is to run the risk of experiencing such regrets as those expressed in these lines by Thomas S. Jones Jr.:

Across the fields of yesterday He sometimes comes to me— A little lad just back from play, The lad I used to be.

And yet he smiles so wistfully Once he has crept within, I wonder i£ he hopes to see The man I might have been.

If we can recall those lines twenty-five years hence, and not see ourselves, we will have returned to Dartmouth all she has given to us. If we can achieve some measure of success and maintain a degree of humility at the same time, Dartmouth will have reason to be proud of us no matter how insignificant our achievements.

The task of coping with whatever the future holds for us is not as difficult as it seems, for as a well-known figure on the Hanover scene recently said, "The wonderful thing about the future is that it comes one day at a time." The tendency of the world today seems to be to do everything in a hurry, to pack twenty-four hours with thirty-six hours of effort. Up to this point we have all taken life pretty much as it came. There is no need to cease now. We could all do worse than to keep in mind the admonition that the Irish cop delivered to the driver speeding through a red light, "Relax bud, you're too tense." It is right to wish to accomplish much, to have high goals and fine ideals to follow in reaching them, but no matter how high the goals or how fine the ideals, we can achieve them most effectively by concentrating on living each day to the best of our ability. Let us make each day count and the future will take care of itself.

The period of preparation for the future is over for most of us. The time for action is at hand. Whether we are leaving Dartmouth better than we found it is difficult to say. Whether we are of the stuff to make full use of the education Dartmouth has given us, is within our power to prove. Let it be our pledge to prove it. In the words of the Twilight Song, "We will make our lives successful, We will keep our hands from shame." Let that be our promiseour farewell to Dartmouth.