Goucher College - Donnybrook Fair Yearbook (Baltimore, MD)

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$2ninr 011355 Hiatnrg HE Class of 1916, in accordance with all the laws of evolution and a a class tradition has passed through four distinct stages of development, Q stages which we shall designate as verdancy, sophistry, responsibility and enlightenment. It was on the twenty-third of September, in the year A of nineteen hundred twelve, that l9l6 came into existence. Meteors 9:! or falling stars did not proclaim her arrival; the heavens were not awe- J struck by her appearance. It was only in her own self-conscious self that V66 she was all-important, the center of attention. During the first few weeks of her verdancy she gradually learned how to iikeep step and to realize that there were others in existence beside her. Oh, what a realization it was! Before she had become accustomed to the ways and manners of this strange realm she was invited to a party where she was forced to roll pennies, and sing, and write poetry. And then she must needs go to a tea where strange things took place2ashe can remember now only a long line of dignified people and a dainty little doll in a queer black dress, a doll about which speeches were made and songs sung. Indeed during this first stage of development she was subject to nothing but frights and scares. Well does she remember the dayajanuary l4eon which her first midyears were posted,eand the vaccination epidemic, and the million-dollar cam paign. But she passed them all successfully, through the boat ride, the never-to-be- forgotten trip to the White House in Washington, and her lantern chain. Sophistry, the second stage of development in the history of 1916, had its beginnings in the turning of the tassels on the fourth of June. By this time she had become a little more used to the ways of this world and it was with eager hands that she initiated her baby sister, I917, into her duties and privileges. We are afraid that she developed an unbearable feeling of self-importance during this period. Nothing seemed impossible to attain and, though unlearned in the field of philosophic principles, she literally hitched her uwagon to a star.H The result was that she won the Kalends Contest, and the tennis tournament. and produced Rip Van Winkle in artistic and finished form. What if her head was turned a little? It was not an abnormal feeling of importance but merely the beginnings of that feeling of responsibility which was to follow. It was sorrow as well as success that made her ready to cast aside the foolishness of childhood and to enter upon her higher sphere of responsibility. From time immemorial we have heard of the dignified Junior, and it was a Junior that I916 came to the realization that she had a task to perform, an example to set. New duties crowded upon her in the form of DONNYBROOK, Junior play, and Junior banquet. With what care she labored over each and with what joy she finally launched them forth to meet the approval or disapproval of the world at large, she alone can tell. DONNYBROOK she presented under the title of a medieval castle; Junior play as a drama Tmcnly-four

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gaminr 0112155 ?Hiainryumnnt. atization of Monsieur Beaucaire, Junior Banquet adapted from Romeo and juliei. That year her sister class, 1918, took her clown the bay, presented her with candy, and entertained her with Camus. Very fond and proud of this 1918 she was. The realization that she was no longer a child passing through circumstances that she did not understand but a Senior was at first difhcult for 1916 to believe. But as the experience grew she liked it, She began to see things in their relations to each other and in a broader light. The future began to shed its alluring ray before her, the past began to fade into dim memory, not as a thing to be utterly forgotten, but as a precious possession that had made enlightenment possible. She became more serious- mincled, more tolerant. All of her faculties were concentrated upon one big purpose, a worthy production of Tmelflh Night. And with that let us leave her. She has not yet, in the fullest sense, shown what she can do; she is standing at the very threshold of a bigger world, one however, that her verdancy, sophistry, and responsi- bility have made possible to enter. She is sorry to say good-bye to all of her friends here. No portents will announce her passing, but may she depart with the feeling that she has played well her small part in this college life, and after she has gone out in the wide, wide world may she be able to keep stepn as bravely, as faithfully, and as truly as she has kept step here. L. L. Twenty Jive