Sesquicentennial Stories: The Promise of UK #138

Reprinted from the July 4, 1930 Kentucky Kernel, "Students Desert Campus on Day of July Fourth"

Utterly forsaken and deathly silent is the campus during the summer school.  All the students have scattered except a few who are especially ambitious and thirsty for knowledge, and who are spending their time in the library.

Even the professors leave.  It is possible and most probable that the janitor, who is always around, may have deserted his post.  Books are left untouched and lessons are forgotten.  In short, there is nothing doing.

But don’t misunderstand! This is the description of the campus on the Fourth of July, on which day the entire constituency of the University summer school is released to add their bit of celebration to the national holiday.

It should be needless to remind anyone that Friday, July Fourth 1930, marks the passing of 154 years since the Declaration of Independence was signed.  Methods of living are considered to have greatly improved since that day.   Science is supplanting the work of a few great brains for a multitude of smaller ones.

Our nation occupies a position of prominence and is respected by all others.  Expansion and organization has been the business of the United States since that day when the Declaration was signed by a few farseeing statesmen.

However, as much as Americans have endeavored to be original and individual, at least a few of the old world characteristics have not been eradicated.  The note of restriction and restraint which our ancestors fought creeps in the following notice:

“One-tenth will be deducted from the final standing of any student who is absent from his last class before the holiday or the first class following it.”