Hampden Sydney College - Kaleidoscope Yearbook (Hampden Sydney, VA)

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i925 The iiialeinusropc 9 principal of the South Boston, Va., High School where his work was valued and sincerely appreciated. The session l899-l9O0 found him at Harvard University making a specialty of English, then, as now, his favorite study. ln the fall of l900, the young teacher entered the Union Theological Seminary at Richmond, Va., and from that school of the prophets he graduated in May, 1903, with the degree of Bachelor of Divinity. The Doctor's degree has later fl924D been conferred upon him by Hampden-Sidney College. He was licensed to preach in September, 1903, and ordained by Greenbrier Presbytery in May, l904, and at once assumed the arduous duties of Sky Pilot in lumber camps at Cass, W. Va., where he lived and labored for two years, l903-l905. ln the latter year, he received and accepted a call to the Windsor Avenue Presbyterian Church in Bristol, Tennessee. ln connection with his duties as overseer of the flock of this church, the young pastor was induced by a realization of the pressing needs of King College at that time to assume the position of general utility man in the Faculty, teach- ing Creek and Mathematics and lending a helping hand wherever help was needed. He was Professor of Bible, also, in the College l907-l9l I. ln I9I l, Dr. Watkins went to Spartanburg, S. C., where he served for six years, being at the same time Assistant Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church and Pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church-a difficult and arduous task to which he gave his best efforts and in which he achieved gratifying success. In l9I 7 his health failed. A throat, always inclined to be weak, gave out under the strain of work and words. The preacher was forbidden to preach by the physicians and was laid on the shelf for eighteen months or more, residing during that period at Asheville, N. C., and at Saranac Lake, N. Y. While pastor at Spartanburg, Dr. Watkins was married, his wife being Miss Dorothea Day, eldest daughter of Orrin Day, Esq., of Catskill, N. Y., at which place the wedding took place Qctober 6, l9I 5. His charming wife, a son and a daughter compose his immediate family. His health having been re-established, Professor Watkins was elected to the chair of English in his Alma Mater and he entered upon his duties in September, l9l8, an unfavorable time at which to begin teaching here, for it was during that fall that the institutions of higher education in the United States were trying to cope with the problems of that nightmare of college officials knovxm as the Students' Army Training Corps. The Department of English at Hampden-Sidney College was organized in l88l by Dr. W. S. Currell, a gifted scholar and an inspirational teacher. In l886-l889, this chair was occupied by Dr. Henry C. Brock-later trans- ferred to the Department of Greek and now Professor Emeritus after thirty- three years of useful and efficient service. He was succeeded as Professor of English by Dr. john B. Henneman who remained here until l893, full of

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8 dlbe Lrtaleinosrnpe 1925 Massachusetts, who, like so many young women of that time, came to the South as a school-marm, but remained to manage and adorn a southern home. This good lady was of Puritan stock-on one side running back to the Colony of Massachusetts Bay and on the other claiming descent from the Whites of Plymouth, Pilgrims of Mayflower days. Those who remember her as teacher in the home of the Rev. Mr. Dance and as mistress of the plantation on Bush River bear testimony to the fact that in theory and in practice she ran true to form -in conscience and in character exemplifying the line traits of her New England ancestry. But enough of ancestors and the process: let us turn to the descendant and the product. though be it understood that pride of ancestry is not vanity, blood will tell. Asa Dupuy Watkins, the son of Richard H. Watkins and Mary P. Dupuy, was boin at College Farm, in Prince Edward County, Virginia, March l4, I873. That old Bush River neighborhood was a charming one then. The old families were still occupying their ancestral homesteads. The Redds, the Dupuys, the Mortons, the Lyles, the Bookers, the Watkinses, the Spencers, the Lacys, and others of the old issue gave a social flavor and a rare charm to the eastern and southern end of the county which one who did not know it can scarcely understand in this day of changed conditions. It was a day of plain living and high thinking, when men preferred io be rather than lo seem, when educational privileges were valued, and when religion somehow seemed to count for more than in these degenerate days. Amid such surroundings the boy grew into a youth, trained by parental hands and moulded by the sweet influences of a Christian home. When the time came for him to go off to school, the youth was sent to an uncle near Oxford, N. C., for one year and then spent another year as a pupil in the Danville Male Academy. This preparatory course ended, young Watkins entered Hampden-Sidney College in l890 and in due course graduated in June, IS94. The Class of IS94, first and last, had fifty-live members, four of whom have at one time or another been members of the Faculty of this College, and many more of them have served their day and generation with marked ability, faithfulness and success. Some years succeeding his graduation were spent by Mr. Watkins in teaching in Virginia. The session l894-95 he was tutor to the Wilcox boys at Flower de Hundredg in IS95-96 he was instructor in Hoge Academy at Blackstone, a school established by East Hanover Presbytery and named in honor of Dr. Moses D. Hoge, which later passed under the control of the Trustees of Hampden-Sidney College and under their management failed, the plant being subsequently bought by Col. Ligon and by him reorganized as the Blackstone Military Academy. For three years, 1896-99, Mr. Watkins was

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l0 Erbs ittaleitlosrnpe 1925 stimulating energy and contagious enthusiasm. Then came Dr. H. R. Mcllwaine, now State Librarian of Virginia, and a historian of national by of repute. After him, for eleven years H907-l9l8j the work was carried on Dr. A. W. McWhorter, who, in l9l8, was shifted to the Department Creek. Thus Dr. Watkins sits in the seats of the mightyg for l suppose no department in the College has been presided over by such an unbroken line of scholarly and erudite men as those who have directed the Department of English from its organization. ln connection with the heavy work of his class-room, Professor Watkins was Librarian of the College from I9I8 to l923, and this is a position of serious responsibility and the faithful performance of its duties requires a large expenditure of time and effort and at times involves a large amount of drudgery. It would not do to omit the statement that while at College Dr. Watkins was a member of the Union Society and of the Pi Kappa Alpha Fraternity. l-le is, also, a thirty-second degree Mason-a Knight Templar. This brief outline of Dr. Watkins' life and work in no way reveals the man nor portrays his attractive personality. It requires a master's hand to catch the essence and the spirit of his fellows and to set them down in cold type so that others may feel and appreciate the charm which words so inadequately express. Dr. Watkins himself can do this to perfection-but obviously his aid cannot be invoked in his own behalf. I-le has a trick of using words which reminds one of the skill of Dr. Henry C. Alexander, that rare genius of half a century ago, and he excels as a writer of obituary notices. A friend once said of him that it would be well for the reputation of those whose lives he describes and whose characters he portrays and most comforting to the feelings of surviving friends if Dr. Watkins could devote his whole time to literary work of this kind-so light is his touch, so graceful is his diction, and so sympathetic is his heart. We have the authority of the poet for the statement that man Can live without poetry, music and art, but this is hardly true of the subject of this sketch. l-le realizes that one must be judged by the way in which one performs one's serious tasks in this work-a-day world: he understands that his vocation is preaching and teaching and he gives his time and strength unreservedly to these great dutiesg but he finds pleasure and profit and recreation in those avocations which have been quoted above as unessentials. l-le loves to count the Muses. He has written a volume of poems, as yet unpublishedg he knows and loves musicg in art he is a connoisseur. As a preacher he is analytical, logical, sound. l-lis matter is well thought outg his manner is earnest and impressiveg his words are carefully chosen- Hlike handfuls of pearls in a goblet of emerald. As a teacher, he is con- scientious, faithful, patient. As a host, he is courteous and thoughtful-