Dallas
Morning News, 6/3/1909, p.9
Sweetwater
High School
Sweetwater, Tex. June 2 – The closing exercises of the Sweetwater High
School was the nit of the season. The
commencement sermon was preached in the Christian Church Sunday morning at 11
o’clock by Dr. Harris, pastor of the First
Baptist Church of Texarkana, the graduating exercises being held in the opera
house last evening, where a vast crowd of people assembled to witness them.
Dr. Harris’ logic was unsurpassed, his flights of oratory and literary
eloquence are seldom surpassed in the pulpit.
He has won the hearts and affections of our people.
The program for the graduating exercises Monday night was a s follows:
Invocation,
Rev. M.S. Dunning; chorus, High School;
salutory, “The Glorious Past and the Golden Future,” Josephine
Sanders; violin Solo, Miss Harrison;
oration, “Whither Are We Tending” Herman Harp; (a) “Venetian Love Song,”
(b) “Gondollers” (Ethelbert Novein), Lilla May
Dunning; “Il Trovatore” (Dorn), Ruth
Bertram; essay, “The Influence of Music,” Ruth
Elliott; Andante and Rondo from “Sonata in E” (Beethoven), Eula
Kimbrough: Class Prophecy,
“Twenty Years Hence,” Leon Maner:
valedictory, “Power of Literature,” Nell Eidson:
annual address, S. Shaw: class song, High
School: presentation of diplomas, scholarships and medals.
There were six graduates from the High School this year: Gladys
Nell Eidson, Josephine Lynette Sanders,
Leon Hrady Maner, Ruth Lenore
Elliott, Lilla May Dunning and Herman
Houston Harp.
It is safe to say that a finer set of young people hardly ever appeared
before an audience on an occasion like this from any High School.
They showed that they had diligently applied themselves and that they had
done splendid research on their subjects. They
seemed perfectly at home on the stage, and their manner of delivery was simply
fine. Their use of language is
seldom equaled by High School pupils, and their articulation and pronunciation,
coupled with the grace and ease with which they delivered their pieces, showed
most excellent training.
When the class filed up the aisle, led by Superintendent
Johnson, the entire High School of undergraduates simply *made the
welking ring*
with High School college yells. This
was followed by yell after yell until the graduates were seated on the stange,
and then climaxed with one of the finest yells the writer ever heard.
The whole audience seemed to catch the spirit and applause after applause
went up. It is safe to say that
such a school spirit seldom possesses a set of students.
After the address, Superintendent Johnson,
in a few well-chosen words of thanks to the people and the board, was about to
call for the class song which closed the program, when S.
Shaw came forward and in a few words presented to the superintendent a
fine solid gold watch charm, a present from the graduating class, as a token of
their appreciation to him for his faithful and earnest work with them during the
past years. The token was too
overwhelming to allow but a few remarks from Superintendent
Johnson, but between him and them in their parting hour there showed a
spirit of affection and friendship, which was real and true.
This closed the third year of Superintendent
Johnson’s administration as superintendent of our schools, but our
people are to be congratulated on the fact that the School Board has elected him
for a term of two years, and at a raise in salary.
This means that our school is in safe hands and that the curriculum will
be raised until we shall rank among the best in the State.
As we now stand our school is affiliated with the University of Texas
for121-2 units. Our enrollment has
more than doubled in three years. We
now have 137 scholastics enrolled for 1909-1910.
Our people are voting bonds to erect ward buildings, that we may
accommodate the children. And if
the straws indicate the direction of the wind, Sweetwater is destined to be the
great center of the great West. With
her splendid railroad facilities and her magnificent schools she is attracting
people from far and wide.
* The word WELKIN means: The sky; heaven; the firmament.
We don’t use this much nowadays—dictionaries usually tag it as archaic or literary—except in the set phrase make the welkin ring, meaning to make a very loud sound. What supposedly rings in this situation is the vault of heaven, the bowl of the sky. In older cosmology this was thought to be one of a set of real crystal spheres that enclosed the Earth, to which the planets and stars were attached, so it would have been capable of ringing like a bell if you made enough noise. The word comes from the Old English wolcen, a cloud, related to the Dutch wolk and German Wolke. Very early on, for example in the epic poem Beowulf of about the eighth century AD, the phrase under wolcen meant under the sky or under heaven (the bard used the plural, wolcnum, but it’s the same word). Ever since, it has had a strong literary or poetic connection. It appears often in Shakespeare and also in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales: “This day in mirth and revel to dispend, / Till on the welkin shone the starres bright”. In 1739, a book with the title Hymns and Sacred Poems introduced one for Christmas written by Charles Wesley that began: “Hark! how all the welkin rings, / Glory to the King of kings”. If that seems a little familiar, it is because 15 years later it reappeared as “Hark! the herald-angels sing / Glory to the new born king”.
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