6/1/71

The memory of my college graduation on this day 50 years ago still burns bright in my mind. Packed in a football stadium on a typically hot late spring day at the University of Missouri, most graduates were "proclaimed" having completed their studies by school, each group standing when called, Not surprising, it was my group of Journalism School graduates who broke from the ranks of the more "sophisitcates" represented by the likes of Business School, Engineering School and others whose school proclamations were heard with a polite standing-in-unison whoosh. Instead, we whooped and shouted as we stood. Our enthusiasm seemed to go over with the laughter and and clapping of family and friends in attendance.

I remember that day with the knowledge that I came away from college with a solid foundation for a career that spanned newspaper reporter and editor, public relations director, marketing vp, marketing communictions consultant, a return to newspaper reporter and current semi-retired freelance writer. These days, I more fully appreciate my education, one that taught me the ability to report the facts, to write with responsible nuance rather than with full-blown bias and ultimstely to tell a story worth considering.

I am equally grateful for the opportuity to have learned this at a time that all those skills were useful in a world mostly full of open-minded recipients.