Graduation from College

With All the Rights and Privileges Appertaining Thereto

Graduation was almost anti-climactic.  I had to work off some required courses that I had been neglecting before I got my sheepskin.  One of those was a biology course.  It was taught by J. R. Endsley, who was not the most exciting educator in the world.   Graduation actually came before finals, so during the semester of your graduation, you had to take finals early. If you were carrying a B average in any given course, you didn’t have to take the final, but I wasn’t carrying a B in biology.  I wasn’t even sure how strong my C was.  After I took my final, I went by Mr. Endsley’s office and said, “I came to find out if I passed your course.”  Endsley preached for some church on Sundays, so he understood things from my point of view.  Without a smile he said, “You did, but it was by grace and not by works.”

Before enrolling for the last semester, I learned that I was going to be short of the required number of hours by one semester hour.   I asked Dr. Southern, the department chair, what I could do to pick up that one hour.   He said “Well you could sing in a chorus.  That carries one hour of credit.”

I knew there was no way I could make the A Capella Chorus, which was the school’s premier choral organization, but there was a singing group called, “The Choralaires.”   There was no audition for The Choralaires.”  You just had to enjoy singing.  I enrolled and thoroughly enjoyed the experience.   I still have my music.   It was really fairly boring stuff except for “Didn’t My Lord Deliver Daniel,” which was a spiritual.  I learned a lot more about singing, and I loved being around the people.  We did an outdoor concert under the stars, which was well attended.

Graduation finally came.  Abilene Christian has a “hooding” ceremony.  Someone sits behind you and places a hood over your head when the degree is conferred.  In case you’re thinking about the kind of hood they put over someone who’s being hanged, let me explain that it’s draped around your neck and hands loose down your back. Normally it’s a parent who does the honors.  It’s usually a parent of the opposite sex.  I was pretty nervous about my mother doing the hooding ceremony because she was susceptible to schizophrenic episodes.  My cousin, Jean, the daughter of my mother’s sister, was a student at ACC at the time.   Jean did the hooding ceremony, and Mama thought it was a great idea.

I received my diploma from B. Sherrod, who was the board chairman at the time.   I always thought B. Sherrod to be the quintessential, “Christian gentleman.”  However, I later learned that he did have his limits.  In his book, No Ordinary University John C. Stevens told about an unhappy set of circumstances in which the school was taken to court by the relatives of a benefactor who had given a large donation to the school.   Apparently B. Sherrod was placed on the witness stand and badgered by the attorney for the plaintiffs.  When he finished his testimony, the judge declared a recess for lunch.  Sherrod stayed around until the courtroom was cleared.  He walked up to the judge and said, “Your honor, what is the fine if I plaster that lawyer’s nose all over his face?”   The judge said, “Just don’t let me see you do it.

Anyway B. Sherrod handed me my diploma.  Don Morris shook my hand and congratulated me, and I walked out with a piece of paper that said I had obtained a bachelor’s degree and all the rights and privileges appertaining thereto.   It took me a while to figure out that if you had enough money to go with it, the diploma entitled you to buy a Coke.  I was dating a young lady at the time, and she came to my graduation.  We went to a drive-in restaurant and ordered Cokes.  They didn’t ask to see my diploma.  I just forked over the change for the drinks. I drove her to her grandmother’s house in Albany, and that’s the way I celebrated by graduation from college.