1986 Commencement Address
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Authors
Breneman, David W., 1940-
Issue Date
1986
Type
Presentation
Language
Keywords
Alternative Title
Abstract
Members of the class of 1986 I regret to announce that we learned late last night that Henry Fairlie, our commencement speaker for this year would not be able to be with us. Consequently they went to the bench, and I am not discovering why you have presidents, somebody’s got to be able to fill in when you are missing a commencement speaker. So if you look at your programs we are jumping directly to the address, which, to be quite honest, does not have a title. I realize now I did not think of a title. However, some of you who have had the misfortune to be at sessions where I’ve been introduced over the course of the last three years know that I have a somewhat standard joke about having a forty-five minute speech all prepared and in my back pocket ready to deliver. A threat which I never follow through on. In fact never in my life did I think my bluff would be called. Actually, however, truth be told, I’ve been dying to give that speech for the last three years. So now I’m going to let you in on a secret. There really isn’t a Henry Jones Fairlie. We made him up just so I would have a chance to fill in and do this talk. Seriously though, I hope you’ll let this incident serve as an object lesson regarding the value of a liberal education. Because someday, one of you may learn on about 2 hours notice that you must address several hundred people on one of life’s most important occasions without a script. I do have a theme, however, for this extemporaneous address, which really came to me this morning and I will label it “The Great Chain of Being”.
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Citation
Publisher
Kalamazoo, Mich. : Kalamazoo College
License
U.S. copyright laws protect this material. Commercial use or distribution of this material is not permitted without prior written permission of the copyright holder. All rights reserved.