{"id":411,"date":"2012-05-09T08:00:34","date_gmt":"2012-05-09T12:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/?p=411"},"modified":"2014-11-29T17:18:18","modified_gmt":"2014-11-29T21:18:18","slug":"musings-on-the-campus-fence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/musings-on-the-campus-fence\/","title":{"rendered":"Musings on the Campus Fence"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a> By Richard Teller ’70, Archivist<\/em><\/p>\n

When I drive to work, I usually come down Brewster Avenue.\u00a0 As I turn onto Park Street, I see the iconic Class Fence, stretching out of sight in both directions, each section with the date of a graduating class.\u00a0 170 of them, so far, going back to 1842.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
2012’s plaque debuts<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It’s a powerful metaphor.\u00a0 Every class is represented, plus one enigmatic “L.L.D.”\u00a0 Last night, at the annual Senior Dinner, the Class of 2012 received their number plaque.\u00a0 There will be many more.\u00a0 Williston Northampton has a lot of fence left.\u00a0 For our seniors, the placing of the plaque is the first traditional milestone in joining the rest of us alumni represented by that fence.\u00a0 (But of course, it isn’t really the first milestone.\u00a0 Enrolling is.)<\/p>\n

The fence dates from 1916, when Headmaster Joseph Sawyer (served 1896-1919), as part of a campaign to celebrate the school’s 75th anniversary, challenged every class to meet certain fundraising targets.\u00a0 Upon achieving them, the class could put its number on the fence.\u00a0 That’s why the dates are not in order; classes met their goals at different times.\u00a0 The campaign was 100% successful.\u00a0 Even those classes which had no surviving members were “adopted” by other alumni groups.\u00a0 At some point mid-century the tradition changed and classes were awarded plaques at the time they graduated.\u00a0 From this point the numbers are consecutive.<\/p>\n

\"L.L.D.<\/a>And the mysterious “L.L.D.”?\u00a0 They were one of Williston Seminary\u2019s fraternities.\u00a0 We don’t know much about them; they were a secret society that kept secrets well.\u00a0 The frats were wisely abolished in 1926-28, but not before the L.L.D. alumni achieved a kind of immortality by pledging and contributing to the fund.<\/p>\n

A number of years ago, a student wandered into the Archives.\u00a0 He had no particular agenda; he’d simply noticed that my door was open, and he’d never been in.\u00a0 I showed him a couple of things that I thought might be of interest, and let him poke around for a while.\u00a0 Finally he said, “This might sound strange, but just knowing that this stuff is here makes me feel like I’m part of something bigger than just my couple of years at Williston.”<\/p>\n

It might have been the best thing any student ever said to me.\u00a0 And no, it didn’t sound strange at all.<\/p>\n

Your comments and questions are encouraged!\u00a0 Please use the space below.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Richard Teller ’70, Archivist When I drive to work, I usually come down Brewster Avenue.\u00a0 As I turn onto Park Street, I see the iconic Class Fence, stretching out of sight in both directions, each section with the date of a graduating class.\u00a0 170 of them, so far, going back to 1842. It’s a … Continue reading Musings on the Campus Fence<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[59,53,347],"tags":[75,73,74,76],"class_list":["post-411","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-about-the-archives","category-campus-and-building-history","category-opinions-rants","tag-class-of-2012","tag-fence","tag-joseph-sawyer","tag-l-l-d"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=411"}],"version-history":[{"count":33,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2668,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/411\/revisions\/2668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=411"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/willistonblogs.com\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}