Headmaster Hill, parents, faculty, staff, students and friends of the Williston community, thank you for your warm welcome. It is an absolute pleasure to be back on campus to help kick off the start off the school year—Williston’s 175th.
Students of Williston, 33 years ago, I sat where you sit today as a new junior to the school, having no way of knowing I was going to be completely transformed by my two years at Williston. But before I tell you how Williston changed my life for the better, I’ve got to address the issue of my name. Think about it…a guy who has the same name as the man who assassinated one of our most revered Presidents, Abraham Lincoln, is speaking to you today. Imagine going through your life with the name John Booth.
“That’s not really your full name, is it?” “Did you shoot Lincoln?” “Is your middle name Wilkes?” And those are just the questions I get from the person I am ordering shirts from at Land’s End! As well, with a name like John Booth it is easy to acquire unsavory nicknames like: “Shooter,” “Assassin” or the ever popular “Wilkes.”
And yet, I am proud of my name…for it forced me to be resilient from a very young age.
Names are important. They often link us to our family’s past or tell something about our ethnic heritage. The surname Booth, as you might have guessed, is an English name and yet it reveals only part of my background. I am also one half Slovak—something my name does not reveal yet is so critical to who I am as a person.
