United States Merchant Marine Academy - Midships Yearbook (Kings Point, NY)

Page 6 text:

. . . FOR WE ARE KINGS POINTERS It was once remarked that the reason that time seems to go faster as one gets older is that as time passes, each day becomes an in- creasingly smaller proportion of the life one has lived. Thus, to a seventy year old, four years is probably not the singularly large amount of time it is to a seventeen or eighteen year old. And yet, by and large that is the age at which most of us decide to accept the challenge of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. For reasons and expectations as varied as the num- ber of candidates in the entering class, we committed ourselves completely to the four-year pro- gram it offered. Some, indeed many, did not last through the four years. Some fall away early on, during the two week indoctri- nation period. Others lasted through the regimentation, but fall victim to academic standards. Throughout the four years we watched the slow but steady flow of departing friends and class- mates, for reasons official and per- sonal, until on graduation day, barely two thirds of the original entering class of 354 remained. For those of us who made it, it was not an easy process, and at times each of us was called upon either academically, regimentally, or in our hearts to justify our con- tinued existence among the ranks of the Regiment of Midshipmen. There was often a great tempta- tion to depart the institution and join our friends, who lived “nor- mal” lives at “normal” colleges. All too often, the heartache, hard- ness, and hypocrisy seemed over- whelming, and the hope of even- tual graduation just a pinpoint of flickering hope across an abyss of dooming and dreadful despair. And yet we stayed. We hung on. We stuck it out, only to graduate as highly trained officers for an industry which we felt by and large didn’t need us. What made it worth it? What was it about Kings Point which made us stay? What mystique, what attraction, made us not only want to attend such a demanding institution, Continued on page 5 2 Opening