The heat from the highway rose before me in rippled waves that danced as they ascended and then disappeared. It was summer and the trip north to Winston-Salem and Wake Forest was nearing an end. I was on Interstate 40 driving a Honda and watching for road signs, while simultaneously talking to my 3 year old, Benjamin, who was securely buckled in his car seat. Occasionally, I would pet Eli, our then 10-year-old sheltie who was curled up beside me. I would also glance in my rear view mirror to make sure the car following which contained my pregnant wife, Claire and our 1 year old, Nathaniel, was not experiencing difficulties.

     I was returning to a place where I had been a student. However, for the rest of the family, it was a journey into virgin territory. Claire had even cried the day before when we left Birmingham. She knew I had a love for the Deacons that was second only to that I held for her but I don't think she knew how deep the feeling ran. Sure, I had sung the fight song nightly to our children when they were still in utero and I had even let my night class leave early more than once when Wake Forest played basketball on television. Now, after 19 years away and appointments in academic institutions from Connecticut to Alabama, I was coming home.

     On that late July day in 1990, however, I made two trips. One was physical; the other was mental. In my head I recalled making my initial journey to then Wake Forest College from my home in Atlanta, Georgia. I was a late teen then and driving a Ford on Interstate 85 (I 40, as we now know it, didn't exist). My car had a tendency to overheat but besides pouring water in the radiator from time to time, I didn't have any problems. It drove well and was large enough to carry the stuff I would need for a successful life as a student. I had chosen Wake Forest because a friend of mine, Ed Hallman, who attended the college said it was: "The next best place to heaven." From the moment I unloaded at then Taylor Dorm and started meeting my fellow classmates I knew I had made a good choice.

     The campus was beautiful but my classmates were equally impressive. They were serious about learning but also a lot of fun. As circumstances would have it, my roommate was a young man from Rocky Mount named Jeff Kincheloe. Unbeknown to us at the time, his grandfather and mine had been roommates at the University of Richmond at the turn of the century. More relevant was the fact that Jeff became a close friend who I still see and visit with on occasions. Then there was Pat Carnes, a young woman from Florida I met at preschool retreat. She taught me about existentialism through telling me stories from French literature. I am sure my philosophy professor would not necessarily have approved of her method but it was effective. In gratitude I set her up on a blind date with a friend of mine in Taylor, John Carriker. They later married. The point is that I arrived at Wake Forest knowing one person and within a week I had as many friends as I had term papers and tests.

     So what has changed at Wake Forest since 1967, the year of my graduation -- a lot and sometimes surprisingly little. Let me first describe the facilities that were the University thirty years ago and then talk about three concepts that I think were present then and continue now -- academic rigor, close relationships, and high ideals.

      I don’t have to tell you about most of these places. I can tell you that Tribble Hall was then, as now, a building of many steps and confusion. Unlike now, all the chairs were bolted to the floor and arranged in rows. The library was a place for socialization as well as enlightenment. On the 8th floor was a coffeehouse that campus ministries under Ed Christman had established. It served as a place to take a study break, get Moravian sugar cake, Russian tea, and look out into the night sky. The passion pits were little cubicles in the women's dorms where you could be alone with your date and practice heavy breathing up to the point where your lips got numb.

     Reynolda Hall was divided into two wings with the administration on one side and student organizations on the other. The Pit, the Grill, and the Mag Room were mutual meeting places where students, faculty, and administrators mingled. Whatever you wanted was served with “grease” in all three eating establishments. It (the grease) was a standard entre long before John Travolta and Oliva Newton-John sang about it. Paul Simon’s "slip sliding away" would have been popular on campus then had it been written.

      Where Benson University Center stands now was a field, sometimes called "Humanities Hollow." It didn’t drain well. I once wrote an article for The Student entitled "The Lakes of Wake." The article featured that field as one of the largest and most prominent of the fresh water bodies that appeared on campus after a good rain. To help dry the field the administration would sometimes spread cigarette filters on the ground to absorb the water. The filters were slippery and soggy when wet. Thus, students got bogged down in that field a number of times, something that has never happened to me in Benson Center. Where Worrell Center stands was "the outer limits." As undergraduates we seldom went there unless we were interested in observing the water tower which was painted a bright gold. Wake Forest had business courses embedded in its liberal arts curriculum but the Calloway School was not envisioned.

     There were no on-campus stadiums, Scales Fine Arts Center, or Calloway Hall. The library was dingy and musty. The Wilson Wing was not in anyone’s mind although Ed Wilson was in everyone’s heart as a popular teacher and administrator. Rooms on the quad were for men only. The rooms were as small then as they are now. I can remember my father saying after his first visit on a family weekend that he didn’t think he could “swing a cat around his head in my room without getting fir in his mouth.” I reminded him subtly that we didn’t swing cats around our heads at Wake Forest unless they came from Clemson.

     Johnson, Bostwick, and Babcock were the women’s dorms. Intervisitation was not allowed although men could visit women in the formal parlors at select hours (i. e., between 11 a.m. and 11 p.m.). The campus was more compact and it was good because the technology of 1967 was quite primitive compared to now.

     In fact, the high tech part of Wake Forest then consisted of fast copying machines in the library that radiated with an eerie but beautiful green light and beverage machines that were then being customized to blink their lights when you made a deposit. There was a computer on campus but I didn't know where it was located and really didn’t care. I think it took up several rooms in the bowels of Tribble or Reynolda Halls. You were considered technologically advanced in 1967 if you had an electric typewriter. There was a phone in every hallway. We communicated mostly face to face or not at all. We worked inside the rules of which there were many (some of which were unrivaled by any) but most of which applied to women.

     The philosophy of Wake Forest in 1967 was in loco parentis and the idea seemed to be that if you kept the women under control, the men would take care of themselves. Women were issued books of regulations and suggestions. Men had no equivalent experience. You could get a UPA in 1967 if you were a woman. A UPA was "undue public affection" and it would get you grounded in the dorms for two weeks. Men were never grounded but they were considered close to the earth. The rumor was that the college took better care of the grass on the quad than the men in the dorms.

      In 1967 there was chapel – twice a week. One day was suppose to be sacred, the other secular. It was often hard to tell the difference but the whole undergraduate student body of 2500 attended chapel religiously because if we didn’t something bad would happen to us, like we would be expelled. There were student monitors who would go up and down the isles noting who was absent. Required chapel was not all bad though. As the luck of the draw would have it, I got to sit next to Nancy Carol Bost one of the most attractive Wake Forest cheerleaders ever. I actually looked forward to Tuesdays and Thursdays at 11 a.m. My senior year my friends elected me president of the Baptist Student Union (at a time when Wake Forest was 40% Baptist) because I had such enthusiasm for chapel.

     There was only one rule about alcohol. Drink on campus and you get to go home to your parents forever. The same went for dancing on campus. Fraternity lounges were considered to be like embassies. They were protected places where you could dance and occasionally drink. My junior year we had a dance on the Reynolda Hall patio to protest the dance policy. It was late in the spring when we made our move and grove (under cover of darkness I might add). Not much happened but we felt we had made a statement and an anonymous donor actually gave Wake Forest a jukebox in support of our effort.

Academic Rigor
     Let me start with academic rigor. Strong scholarship has always been a tradition at Wake Forest. I know you know this but let me document this fact by reading from a publication of 1967 that was issued to all entering Wake Forest women entitled Happiness is Being a Deacon Coed (p. 13). (Don't ask me how I secured this document).

" At Wake Forest you will probably be surprised by the keen academic interest and competition." There will have to be an adjustment when you discover that there are a lot of people with a lot of intelligence."
While US News and World Report did not rank colleges in the 1960s, the brief passage I read indicates, students (at least the women) at Wake Forest then as now knew they were coming to an academically competitive college. But they also knew more as Happiness went on to state, "You will find courses hard but stimulating and challenging" (p. 13). Indeed, we did and many of you still do.

     In 1967 and 1997 the tradition of academic rigor was represented by the bluebook. During my student days, I was convinced that life was an essay. I can still recall one of my professors saying something to that affect and that the answers to significant questions are never found in the back of a text. Thus, I like many of you realize it is not enough to know information. You need to know information about information. If you can't explain something, it doesn't exist -- at least in any meaningful way. (These are lessons some of your friends in other colleges have yet to learn).

     Now I won't tell you everyone was a scholar at Wake Forest in the 60s anymore than everyone is now. Certainly then and now, students were intellectually capable. However, some did better than others. The reason was simple -- showing up and studying. I can remember a certain classmate of my time, a male, named "Chick." (Lord knows where he got the name) Chick would sit next to the window in a History of England class with Professor Forest Clonts. Mr. Clonts was rather old and was constantly looking at the roll book when calling names. After Chick answered he was in attendance, he would jump out the window. (You could say he flew the coup or flew the class or flew the Clonts). Whatever you might say, the fact was that with the coming of bluebooks, Chick was gone. It was painful but it was reality. He hadn't a clue as what he should do with the blank pages before him.

     From the insight of hindsight, I am glad bluebooks were and are abundant at Wake Forest. In graduate school I found that I had written more than my peers. While I may have occasionally gotten writers’ cramp as an undergraduate, I had a hand up (as opposed to a leg up) on people from other colleges. I told people then and I still say that my most rigorous and rewarding educational experience was being as an undergraduate at Wake Forest.

Close Relationships
     In 1967 as in 1997 Wake Forest had a tradition for friendliness. The book of Happiness attests to the centrality of relationships in a passage on page 8. It goes as follows:
"Your hallmates will be your second family. You will eat together, talk together, disagree together, study together. The smallness of Wake Forest enhances close relationships not only student to student but student to faculty. You will notice immediately the tradition of friendliness. Everyone speaks when they meet on campus." I can remember making some new friends that way and I suspect there are many of you who share that experience.

     Not only were relationships with fellow students important but as Happiness so aptly states on page 14, faculty-student relations were valued. Again, I quote:
"and there are your professors. Believe it or not, they are human and can become good friends. They have regular office hours or will be glad to give you an appointment to talk over problems that can't be remedied during the short class time."

     I found this to be true and I bet you have too. Faculty make time for students at Wake Forest, always have, always will. Teaching is central to the mission of the University. In my own day, I can remember seeing one of my English professors, D. A. Brown, a number of times. He was kind but strict. I made a "C" under him my first semester and went to see him about it. He sat me down, went over my final, and said, "You can make a 'B' under me if you work harder." And he was right. I loved English, still do, but I found I was never given a grade at Wake Forest because of love. It is something I still appreciate just as I still like to occasionally listen to the rock group that reminds me of writing English papers then -- "Blood, Sweat, and Tears."

High Ideals and Aspirations
     Finally, let me address high ideals and aspirations. A brief quote from Happiness is an indicator of the high ideals that come down from the past. On page 24 of the booklet come these words: "you have the freedom to develop courtesy, integrity, and morality."

     High ideals are a tradition at Wake Forest. They are symbolized by both concepts and activities. On the conceptual side is honor. Honor was a strong part of Wake Forest in 1967. Maybe it was a simpler time but I don’t think that is why honor was held in high esteem then. I think that the concept was embraced because it seemed noble and challenged the campus community to live with integrity. I think honor is still revered at Wake Forest today. The processes by which honor is upheld may need refining but the concept is valid.

     Along with honor another concept I think that is part of Wake Forest's high ideals is reverence. By reverence I mean a sense of awe for those things highest, noblest and most worthwhile. Such a reverence includes a respect for the University's past, each other, and, I believe, for God, as we understood God to be. Such reverence brings with it a sense of community that transcends the mundane, the petty, and the cynical that people are all too often prone to get caught up in. Out of reverence comes the study of such things as the arts and religion, a focus that can go on for a year or a lifetime.

     When I think of Wake Forest in 1967 and 1997, I am also impressed with a tradition of hope that seems to run through time. One of my initial memories of Wake Forest was seeing a sign in the Pit during football season that read: “How can we lose when we’re so sincere?” Well, it was easy I thought if the other teams are bigger and stronger. However, I can remember going to many games Wake Forest was picked to lose and seeing us upset an opponent. The best win of my college days came when I watched the Deacons, who were having a rare but disastrous losing basketball season, beat number three ranked Duke in triple overtime. I was at the game with friends and a Spanish book (since I had a mid-term the next day).

     The high ideals of honor, reverence, and hope I think have led people associated with Wake Forest to have the courage to act in the best of ways in the worst of times and circumstances. Wake Foresters like William Poteat fought to keep the minds of North Carolinians open in an era where narrow fundamentalism could have become pervasive. Harold Tribble campaigned endlessly to improve the school through moving it. Ed Reynolds put his life on the line to bring integration to Wake Forest long before it was accepted in most institution's of higher education. And Jessica Davey organized a small group of peers to go to of all places Calcutta, India, on a student initiated trip to work with Mother Teresa and serve the poorest of the poor thus broadening horizons for our students far beyond the western world and themselves.

     High ideals and aspirations made all these experiences possible. They are but a few of the visionary ways Wake Foresters have positively affected others. Time and movement have not erased the good and noble goals of Wake Forest in serving humanity. Indeed our institutional motto of "Pro Humanititae" is something that has guided the past, still guides the present, and will continue to guide the future of this University.

     As I envision the future, I can imagine the year 2027 and one of you who is now a student driving back to Winston-Salem with your spouse and children. It may be you are returning to teach here or it may be you are coming for just a brief visit. Regardless, the school you will come to will differ from that before you today at least outwardly. As you gaze on the horizon some buildings will be familiar to you like old college friends. Some professors you knew in 1997 will remain. But most noticeably, there will be change on the campus because change is a constant. Yet within your mind and in the marrow of your bones, my wish and belief is that you will see Wake Forest anew and in the process know its traditions and feel its impact again as if for the first time.