Class of 1947 Reunion Melvin E. Thayne We read something in the Bible, and then we read it a second time and find new meaning. In James I read this statement: "For what is your life. It is even a vapor that deters for a little time and then it vanisheth away." When I more recently read this, I thought of how short life is. If we look back fifty years, we can realize just that. Neal Maxwell talks about "splendid strangers." And to me that is exactly what you all are. Those of you who are here today, and many who are gone or unable to come here -this was a high caliber student body assembled at Weber. In 1944 and 1945, there were only 465 students at Weber. The next year, 1945 to 1946, the enrollment doubled to 967, and the year that we graduated there were 1,808. Last night at commencement, there were 1,900 plus grads who received degrees. There were more graduates in the one senior class than there were of all of us, even after doubling for several years. Did you know that President Henry Aldous Dixon served twice as president of Weber? From 1919 to 1920, and then he came back again in 1937 to 1953. Seventeen years is longer than any other president that I read about in the wonderful Weber State College Centennial History. President Dixon was appointed a member of President Truman's Commission on Higher Education. He went to Washington, D.C., and he was considered an expert in junior college and all areas of higher education. In the fall of 1946, he proposed to the State Board of Education that we become a four-year college. Dean Hurst, Ernie Bingham, Kay Randall, Willis Wynn, and many others went down to Salt Lake City to encourage legislators to make Weber a four-year school. In 1949, House Bill 12 passed the legislature, but J. Bracken Lee vetoed it. I asked Governor Lee to explain the legislative system to a group of student officers. He harangued us for the whole period of time about education getting way too much money. So, I can see why he didn't favor four-year status for Weber. However, in 1959, Governor Clyde signed the bill that enabled Weber to become a four-year school. Ruth Dixon Cannon talked about the 175-acre Mills property that we are standing on now, although the campus has been enlarged since that original purchase. Dean Hurst tells me there are over 400 acres. The Mills property was the start of it, and that happened in 1947, the year we were here. President Dixon had the foresight to know that ultimately we would need a larger campus. Weber ultimately was recognized as one of the top 15 junior colleges in the United States. I recently learned something new about our basketball team. According to an article in Vista magazine, we had the best basketball team in the United States 1947. The article said that Weber defeated Utah State, and Utah State defeated the University of Utah, and in 1947, the University of Utah won the national championship. Weber had a very powerful basketball team at that time. You all remember dear Dr. Leland Monson, who had a bit of a speech impediment. He often read Shakespeare and put me right to sleep. It was beautiful the way he did it. Anyhow, I don't know how it started, but Laurence Burton and I began to mimic Dr. Monson. As we passed each other on the quad, I would say "Good morning, Laurence" (mimicking Dr. Monson), and Laurence would say "Good morning, Melvin" (also mimicking Dr. Monson). I think maybe Will and others were also doing it. One day I passed Dr. Monson and, without thinking, said "Good morning, Dr. Monson" (mimicking Dr. Monson). Remarkably, I still got an A in the class! Mel Thayne President Dixon at home 116 Class of 1948 Reunion Dean Hurst One of the first things I realized after I became Director of Alumnni Relations was the importance of older alumni - more mature alumni. I came up with what I called the "Golden Alumni Chapter" in 1969, and as I looked at all of those 50-year grads who came back from the Class of 1919, I couldn't believe that one day I would be one of that same golden group. A lot of water that has gone down the pipe the past fifty years. We have all changed a little bit. As someone said about the reunion last night, "Everyone has gotten so old and gray that they didn't recognize me anymore." Actually I am going to back up a couple of years. It wasn't just the Class of '48. We had started in '46, and some of us started even before then in 1944, right out of high school. I want to tell you it was a lot different then than it is now. There were 450 girls, for those of you who remember - 450 girls and 50 men. I mean, girls who wouldn't look at you in high school were suddenly clamoring for a date, and we were very debonair about whom we accepted. There were no athletics, no men to have athletic teams, no clubs. They did have a group called Wildcat Club -all the men were one together with kind of an e pluribus unum. The thing I remember most was an event called the Polygamist Prance. Some of you guys may have already been called up, and there were only a few of us left. We were Biblical about it; we went to Isaiah where it said: "In the last days seven women shall take hold of one man saying 'come, let us be called in thy name.'" So you did, by mandate, have to take all of the girls that asked you up to seven. After seven, you could say no. There were no station wagons or vans in those days, so transportation posed a real problem. I remember Laurence Burton came to the Polygamist Prance with his seven wives in the back of a milk truck in little red Sunday School chairs. And the problem really began with whom you took home first - or rather whom you took home last. I was Biblical about that, too: "The last shall be first and the first shall be last." It just so happened that Bev Fair asked me first, and I wanted to take her home last. And I did! After the service we all came back - most of us. We came back privates, captains, and colonels. We even had one Congressional Medal of Honor winner: George Wahlen. We were a great group. Suddenly, 450 or 500 students became 1,750 students; only this time there were 1,250 men and only 500 women. It was a three-to-one ratio. Now you girls had your pick, and Glenn and I were back among the ranks of the "unemployed." I didn't know at the time that we were going to make history. From the window of my little art studio, I painted a scene looking north towards Ben Lomond. If you were to put the University in front of it, that is what you would see today. But in 1948, in our year, that is pretty much what it looked like. Weber, which had been known as the "Dixon School for Girls," was suddenly an active, vibrant campus, and we were in the early throes of bursting at the seams. But we picked up where we left off. We tried to re-establish a lot of the old traditions. Many clubs started again: Excelsior, Alpha Rho, Sigma, Viking, Frenesti, and the rest. The girls' clubs, very active during the war years, kept going. We started programs in football and basketball. Charles Fronberg got a tennis team going, and we had baseball and track. Glen Nelson was instrumental in publishing the old handbook; we started Scribulus, and produced the Acorn, the yearbook that had not been published since 1942. One of the traditions we started again shortly after the war was the Flaming W Hike. Remember the 1946 Flaming W Hike at Malan's Peak? Because fuel was scarce up there, we got Dick Fair, who had been a bomber pilot during the war, to make an air drop of gasoline and straw. Dick kind of missed the peak and dropped bales of straw and gallons of gasoline all over the mountainside. Nevertheless, the Flaming W Hike was re-established. I remember one problem with that burgeoning student body was that we were suddenly running out of room. You ladies, coeds, had a marvelous facility - you had a girls' lounge. We men had to sit on the steps of the Gym Building. It was called the men's lounge. It was super because you could ogle the girls who went by, who knew they were being ogled. We had a great program that first year called "Varsity Vignettes." President Dixon, that dear man who knew most of our names, realized the potential for four-year status and began promoting it right at that time. So the "Varsity Vignettes" took a theme of "Weber Through the Years." One of the acts was Laurence Burton, Rulon Garfield, and me in an old song-and-dance routine. We looked around and found a guy who wasn't afraid of making a fool of himself - Hy Sander - and had him accompany our little routine. It was known simply as "The Act." We did a little number called "Take a Little Tip From Father." The first of it went: "Take a little tip from Father - come on and take a little tip from Dad." We didn't have a lot of talent, but we performed that act all over the state. One day in an assembly, Dean Hurst 117