Virginia Military Institute - Bomb Yearbook (Lexington, VA)

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fattnn Bom: August 15, 1859 Died: November 8, 1924

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' . - . ' l Old Gods and New Altars The bells of years are ringing ivith the chants of long ago As ive travel doivn the Avenue of Age, But the fires of predecessors are hut embers faint aglow. While the shadoivs dance the antiquated stage ; The older order changes, old is giving ivay to new. Though traditions of our fathers glorify. And the sometime school is passing ivith its trailing retinue. As the valor of a valiant V. ] 1. I.. ' If c arc marching ever upward, ever striving tozcard the great. Holding course ivith every guidon tozcard the best; And the Caravan of Youth is not to be denied the fate That justifies the ardent seeker ' s quest. Let us, then, before ice pass on, icave a hearty farc-thcc-ivcll. For the hour glass of time is running dry — A nd you trumpets of the future, blast the dirges of death knell, As you herald in the Greater J . I I. I.! O. B. A., Jr., ' 25.

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Virginia Military Institute HE ' irgi[iia Military Institute is in its eighty-sixth year. From small beginnings ill 1839, Avith but very meager provision of quarters and equipment of any kind, I --r rsB ' i - ' ' teaching staff of two, with a patronage of less than fifty cadets, it has a ' Hu}© grown, as we know it today, into next to the largest military school of the 3 : country on a collegiate basis. It has added to its grounds from year to year; it has more than doubled the size of its original barrack building; it has acquired and built in recent times a large number of officers ' quarters and other necessary buildings; its material equipment is hard to measure in terms of what it was even thirty or forty years ago; its teaching and military staff has now reached a personnel of between fifty and sixty men; its matriculates for the present session run over six hundred and fifty cadets, and this number could be materially increased if more ample accommodations were provided, and it were thought desirable to do so in addition. But whether in youth or in maturity — and an institution such as V. M. I. should never grow old except in years — the ends, the aims, the ideals of our school have continued the same from the beginning; namely, to build up character in youth, to develop physical, mental and moral manhood, to prepare our young men for the duties of life wherever their lot be cast, to fit them for the defense of their country in case of need. Accomplishment has followed promise in abundant measure. Search the rosters of its graduates and eleves to find a long, long list of those who have gone out from these walls and whose lives have adorned , their calling whether in higher or lower walk, at the bar, on the bench, in the pulpit or forum, in high command in the field of arms, or as humble privates, in the ranks of armies or of peaceful workers — thev have exemplified in their living, or dying, and brought to fruition the priiicinles imbibed here, the seed sown here. Few must be the words here for any historical sketch of the Institute. To manv men is honor due for its guidance and development: Boards of visitors, superintendents, faculties, and its ever-increasing number of alumni in these latter years, whose interest and admiration and love for Alma Mater is one of her main sources of strength as well as one of her chiefest assets. Three superintendents only have directed its course and managed its affairs for eighty-five years. The Western Arsenal at Lexington became, by act of the Virginia Legislature, the Vir- ginia Military Institute in 1839; the garrison of young soldiers became a school of young cadets on November 11 of that year. The first board of visitors, to inaugurate the changed conditions, had appointed as the first superintendent a young man of twenty-seven, a distinguished graduate of West Point, and for fifty years General Francis H. Smith exercised the high trust with con- spicuous ability and success. In its infancy, in its youth, in its maturer years, in good and evil days, this school was the object of his unremitting interest, of his zealous care. With very limited resources he had to plan and build for immediate needs and look ahead for future growth and development. With the coming of the grievous times of Civil War, General Smith had to disrupt the orderly working of the school, but it was an occasion worthy of a great cause, for his order sent forth the corps of cadets under one of its professors, the immortal Jackson, to do valiant service in defense of state and Southland. By his order also did the corps make that march under the command of its trusted commandant. Colonel Scott Shipp, which culminated in the glorious day of New Market in ' 64. But throughout the terrible four years of war General Smith never gave up. He preserved the nucleus of the school, whether in or away from its home, awaiting the dawn of a better day; he saw its buildings burnt, its equipment destroyed, but when peace came he planned and built A