Transcript: First Graduation
Description: Welford Bowling, one of the college’s original students, discusses the first commencement ceremony.
Welford Bowling:
I guess the funniest thing was the night we graduated with four people.
Interviewer:
Can you tell me about the graduation. Was it treated with proper pomp and ceremony?
Welford Bowling:
Oh yeah. As far as I'm concerned it was. We had it in the Milton Sommers school cafeteria, of course it has since been rennovated. And I would say that it was held with all of the festivities that would go with such an occasion other than the size of it. And yet there were an awful lot of outside people with good wishes for the College itself, and for myself and the Jenkins boy, I can't think of his name right now.
Interviewer:
Walter?
Welford Bowling:
Walter, right. We both went to La Plata High School, and a lot of the people who knew Bruce Jenkins and many of the county people who had a vested interest in making the College work came. So it was a pretty good sized crowd despite the fact that there were only four of us.
Edited from the original interview on March 18, 1980. Original interview available as part of the Southern Maryland Studies Center Oral History Collection.