Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1925-06-18

endeavor, accordingly, shall be to do
what can be done with reasonable
brevity toward realizing the early
forenoon hour; to persuade, If we can,
the clock to go backward to that Sep
TENDER Commencement when the men
of our most illustrious class clapped
their brand-new parchments to their
bosoms and took the numbering stage
from Brunswick for the Hall of Fame.
Il wish 1 could make clear the
thought first suggested by this twice
golden anniversary of Golden Age. I
wish I could transform our common,
everyday imagination into kinetic
agency fit to span an intervening CEN
fury and fetch into actual presence the
hamlet inhabited by the earlier Bow
doin, the laurels overhanging Massa-
chusetts and Maine and Winthrop,
and the young Mother, smiling and Sc
rene then as ever since, holding the
boy by his hand"
OF the Reverend Doctor william
Allen, president of Bowdoin while the
class of 1924 was, in college, Mr..
Mitchell was humorously critical:
Il have ventured to dwell, perhaps
unduly, perhaps somewhat disrespect-
fully, upon the absence from the re-
sponsible executive, in the time Of the
class Of 1925, of the stimulating in
luence normally to be expected there
and adequately supplied, in one form
or another, by every one Of President
Aliens predecessors and successors.
He serves purpose now because he
typifies the dull background of paleo-
lithic thought and sleasy expression,
against which Hawthorne and Long
fellow were to flower brilliantly in the
revolution in American letters they
went forth to lead; as distinctly seces-
sionists, be it insisted, modernists, fu-
turists, as any of the pioneers of
method today. And though this ap-
praisal may seem, not entirely gra-
cious in day of celebration, retro
spect would be untrue If 1t blinked the
fact that SO far as that Bowdoin
president was concerned. well as he
meant and worthy man Of God as he
undoubtedly was, the situation here
abouts 100 years ago was mitch the
same as If some grotesque delinquency
of Providence had intrusted a Martin
Farquhar Upper with the upraising
of a TenHyson, a Browning and a
Hardy.
Fortunately for 1925 there was then
in the Bowdoin Faculty conjunction
of virile tntel1ects and appealing per-
sonalities. group of professors and
instructors uncommon in any institu-
ton at any time. Not less certain
than that the whale swallowed Jonah.
and not Jonah the whale, is 1t that the
mind of, President Allen did not domi-
nate Newman and Smyth and Pack
ard and Upham and cleveland.
.1These five men of science and In
dividual force practically constituted
the Bowdoin that mothered 1926 and
class after class succeeding. They
served her we'll as instructors and
professors for an average of 10 years;
Packard's, the longest term, 65 years
of ceaseless devotion. They gained
wide reputation for the college and
themselves. Can these few words
make each of them seem something
more than an archaic name ch1seled on
stone-seem a real person, accomplish
ments. idiosyncrasies and all, real as
one of the good Bowdoin professors
now functioning?
Next, the campus through the tele-
scope. The tavern was here where
this church stands, with Hawthorne
end Frank Pierce among its customers
bibulous, in weather-brained compah-
ionship until Hawthorne persuaded
Pierce-or 'Perse' as he used TO pro-
nounce the name-to QUIT booze ana
study hard for the Presidency; IL il
not an anomaly of history that as
years went by this President OF tns
United States should be remempe.eu
chiefly because of his assoclation VIZ
the literary renown or the sny aurnol
of his campaign biography OF the No'e
poo,rs and of the Marble Faun?
"Yonder. the small cluster of hal
,owea bricks and beams; Massachu.
setts much the same as now, except
for its perky superimposed cupoia;
codom and Gomorrah as they are,
Maine Hall, until it burned, dignlneo
os to the western front by portai 90
sianad nv an architect so absent
n,inded that he once drove to Bath IN
a chaise. hitched his horse there nm
ished his errands, ,and, forgetting the
RIO awaiting him, walked all the way
hac, TO Brunswick; the emily nttie
wooden chapel, facing north, IN Iroh'
Of where the Hubbard library Is; the
nresident's house near the oak; Apple
ton. subsequently styled the new oe-
r,,s,,am then non-existent like the
r,nre modern structures of the ensem-
hIa. a nseudo-Gothic building known
&c president Aliens Preparatory
school looming to the southwes!
across Main street, then the primevai
road leading to Bungo-nungo-nock' the
indian name of the nearest salt water
IF Casco Bay; dormitories with rooms
of Spartan nudity, with closets ~
which the occupants could sport the
oak for study or silent meditatlon up,
On their sins; unfortunate grouho
story freshmen acting as Tags Tor the
tutor or professor overhead, ana sun
iect to call for errands OF other per,
sonal services when he stamped naru
three times on the uncarpeted hooi.
Down to my own day we USED TO lug
our firewood, make our hres' trim our
kerosene lamps, and pump and trans
MORT in wooden pals the liquid need
ed for ablution or the satisfaction OF
awful thirst. Such was the Bowdoin
ward. a sandy stretch fringed on the
west and south by dismal Balm OF
CiIeads. on the other sides by the siD-
iIIant pines; and in the yard ana
around it about 100 fellows, made In
the eternal mould Of ardent youthful
ness. exercising muscles and alert IN
tellectuai curiosity. studying ana
f,unking, praying and shamming, al
miring and sneering, despairing and
aspiring, exactly as do these fellows
now. and, / suspect, precisely as did
their counterparts under Pericles or
Sargon.
AT Commencement time booths for
the sale of pies, doughnuts. ginger
bread and small and larger beverages
crowded near the campus. Commence
ment was an occasion Of picnic COM
bined with stately ceremony. Large
numbers of volunteer assistants drove
in from the outlying districts. The