Contact: Sammy McDavid
Richard E. Holmes and MSU President Charles Lee
.--In his address to Mississippi State graduates Saturday, the university's first African-American student began by recalling some of his experiences nearly four decades ago.
Dr. Richard E. Holmes, who recently joined the MSU health center medical staff after practicing some two decades in Alabama, told a packed Humphrey Coliseum audience that, in the years since first enrolling in the summer of 1965, inquiries regarding his student experiences can be summed up in three basic questions.
"People have asked me 'What did you learn? How were you treated? What happened?'" Holmes recalled. "I tell them, and I tell you, that I quickly learned that Mississippi State was, and is, a university that promoted excellence, a university committed to progress and fairness."
Speaking in a soft, measured voice that is his trademark, he added that, "Granted, during my enrollment, I was not nominated to be Mr. MSU, nor voted most popular. I also learned that my name could be abbreviated and pronounced in many different ways. I learned, too, that I could study at any table in the library or eat at any table in the cafeteria without having to share my notes, or my food."
Despite the obvious loneliness of his historic situation, Holmes said the "most impressive and vivid memory of my time here as a student is the fact that the MSU student body, and the MSU family as a whole, treated me with dignity and respect.
"I always was moved by the fact that no student would close a door in my face as I entered a classroom or building," he continued. "If students preceded me into a building or classroom, they would simply hold the door until I entered. Only a university dedicated to fairness and excellence could have carried out such an orderly transition and such a quiet burial of past practices."
More than 2,100 students were candidates for degrees in the spring semester of Mississippi State's 125th year. Charles B. Cliett of West Point, emeritus head of the school's aerospace engineering department, also was awarded an honorary doctorate in science.
Holmes told the departing students that, as college graduates, they possessed a three-pronged torch of knowledge illuminating progress, unity and hope.
"You can use your torch to enlighten people in other parts of the country," he said, "to let them know that we are a great people, let them know that we can be fair and let them know that, despite what they may have read or heard, Mississippi is a fine place to live, work and retire."
He urged the graduates to make time within the next year to reflect on what higher education had taught them. "When you have graduated from the sanctuary of Mississippi State University, when you have left the protection of your home and when you have enrolled in 'Life 101,' it will be clear, sometimes painfully clear, that you will need to believe in yourself.
"When you have a steadfast belief in yourself," he added, "your torch can be seen through the smog of Los Angeles or through the fog of Staten Island. And it can be seen from the Natchez Trace on a moonless night."
Holmes concluded with a personal appeal. "I challenge you, I implore you to continue to carry the torch for Mississippi State, continue to carry the torch for Mississippi, continue to carry the torch for your families, and, above all, continue to carry the torch for yourselves," he said.