Lowell Technological Institute - Pickout Yearbook (Lowell, MA)

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Dean Reed’s Message Congratulations to the Class of 1951 Y ou are the first class to be graduated from Lowell Textile Institute in the second half of the twentieth century. The men and women who have been graduated before you have established enviable records for themselves and have carried the fame of the Institute literally around the world. You are better prepared than your predecessors — because the Institute has continued to develop — hence more will be expected of you. We are depending upon you to enhance our standing before the world. The fact that these are not normal times could well be taken as a challenge. Opportuni- ties are often greater in abnormal times and the well prepared young man or woman with energy, ambition and initiative will advance both faster and farther. This is true because the old order of seniority weakens and preferments are given to those who demonstrate the qualities of leadership. Many of you will be expected to spend a period of time in the Armed Services. This is part of the duties of citizenship and should not be deliberately avoided. It is true that you will not be following the profession of your choice but you need not be marking time. It has been well said that Every experience can be of value if you will let it. Extra effort on your part will make this period a valuable supplement to your training and will pay you dividends in the future. And so, again. Congratulations, Class of 1951! ( [8]

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Dean Williams 9 Message W hen you cross the platform on Commencement Day, the second half of the Twentieth Century will have begun — and most of you will have finished the eleven years which mark the second half of your lives to date. In that half, you have witnessed the greatest and deadliest war of human history, fought for the right of human beings to live as free men — the advent of the Atomic Age — the establishment of a world organization which has had the courage, the will, and the power to meet its responsibilities bv taking action in force to prevent the enslavement of a free people — and the rise of the United States to a position of leadership in the councils of the free nations of the world. In a more local sense, you have seen Lowell Textile Institute in the process of moving from a war-time enrollment of 71 students to an all-time peak of over 600 — the addition of new fields of study — the completion of residence halls and a library — the expansion of its educational facilities — the grant of funds for additional expansion — and, of high importance, the rise of student organizations and the development of student government on the campus. In some of this you have necessarily been a spectator — but in campus affairs you have been participant and leader in helping develop the new and increasingly fine things in campus life and campus action. All this is good, for human progress is always the sum-total of the acts of men who have vision and who do. Some, and there are few, are those who envision the richness and purpose of which human life is capable, who define the goals, and then lead others against the forces of mind and spirit which hinder man’s efforts to attain those goals. Others, and many are needed, are those who catch that vision, and then have the will and the courage to follow and to fight for what they are convinced is essential and good for all men. Your lives, to date, have offered you more than formal education: they have placed you upon the threshold of what may well be a new, and perhaps the greatest, era in human history. My sincerest wish is that your futures may give you a constant challenge to the highest and best of your creative abilities — and that you, too, may have the vision and the will to do your share in moving the world a little closer to man’s finest destiny. f 9 J