University of Mary Washington - Index

University of Mary Washington - summer08 - Index

ON CAMPUS
A Celebration Fit for a 100-Year-Old
How do you cap a festive year-long celebration and throw a
history-making 100th birthday party for an institution?
If that institution is the University of Mary Washington,
you invite the governor and other dignitaries, you schedule
the country’s most prominent historian as keynote speaker,
you throw in the Eagle Pipe Band and a moving rendition
of the Alma Mater, and you arrange with Mother Nature
for a gorgeous spring day. Also, you select an individual to
represent nearly every class in the school’s history; you have
select members of the Class of 2008 robe and process, you
fill Dodd Auditorium to capacity with alumni, community
members, and friends of UMW; and you infuse the ceremony
with as much dignity and grace as can be mustered. Then,
you top it all off with a lively evening ball under tents erected
at the center of the Fredericksburg campus.
By all accounts, the University of Mary Washington’s
Founders Day on March 14, 2008, was extraordinary and
exquisite.
As keynote speaker David McCullough put it: “To be here
on Marye’s Hill in Virginia on a beautiful day
such as this to commemorate such good
work over 100 years is an honor I will never
forget, a pleasure beyond my expression,
and my gratitude could not be greater.”
McCullough, who had earlier in
that week appeared with Tom Hanks
at the première in Richmond of HBO’s
version of McCullough’s John Adams, was
introduced by Centennial Celebration Co-
Chair Carter Hudgins as “America’s most
beloved biographer.” Hudgins credited
McCullough with “resuscitating narrative
history.”
Hudgins pointed out that McCullough
continued a distinguished line of
anniversary speakers at Mary Washington
(all, he said, “arguably the best historians
of the era”) – Arnold Toynbee at the 50th
and Daniel Boorstin at the 75th.
The author of such blockbusters as
1776 and Truman, McCullough focused
his remarks on the importance of
history. [See excerpts from his speech on
page 88.]
One participant, UMW Board of
Visitors Vice Rector Nanalou Sauder
’56, described Founders Friday as “the
best day I have ever spent at Mary
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UNIVERSITY OF MARY WASHINGTON MAGAZINE����������������
UMW Board of Visitors member
Benjamin W. Hernandez '95 greeted
David McCullough, while Rector J.
William Poole looked on (top), before
McCullough spoke at the March 14
Founders Day Convocation Ceremony
inside a packed Dodd Auditorium
(middle). Virginia Gov. Timothy M.
Kaine (bottom) also appeared at the
centennial event, praising UMW as a
leader in Virginia higher education.
Photos by Reza A. Marvashti