2008 Slideshow

St. Pat’s 2008 --- An Alumnus Viewpoint

This is the perspective of a UMR grad on the St. Pat’s 100th Celebration. I had been eagerly anticipating this event for the past few years and made hotel reservations in March 2007. My family and I, (4 UMR grads total) left our homes in Illinois (435 miles from Rolla) as early as midnight Friday so we could arrive in time for the Gonzo games. As it turned out, we really didn’t have to get here that soon. There were only a handful of people at the Intramural center when we arrived at 10:30AM. No one seemed to know what was going on. It was not until 12:30PM or so that a few people started to arrive. The games---ah yes, the games--- as best I could tell, consisted of dart throwing. If there were other games, I missed them completely. Some students were playing catch with a football and others were playing “knock-out” with a basketball. Where were all of the fraternities, sororities and other organizations? The highlight of the afternoon was the Anheuser-Busch Beer Garden and the Skoal tent. By the way, much thanks to Anheuser-Busch for providing free refreshments and the Clydesdales on Saturday, but what the heck was Skoal doing there passing out free tobacco?

The parade on Saturday was long, over 1-1/2 hours. It was probably one of the longest, if not the longest, in history. Viewing fire trucks, police cars, cranes, pick-up trucks, motorized lawn mowers and such are to be expected in a parade. What I had a problem with was MST student participation. MST has 19 social fraternities and 4 sororities and numerous other sanctioned organizations. Where were their floats? The floats I did see were pathetic and showed that very little effort had been put into design and construction. This university’s underlying foundation is engineering for Pete’s sake. I have seen better high school homecoming floats. Apparently, the members of these organizations did not see the slide show that was being shown in the Alumni office on Saturday. The floats in the past were great and showed pride in their organizations. I truly believe that if I had arrived in Rolla on Wednesday, I could have prepared a better float then the ones I saw on Saturday.

There were several high school bands in the parade. Most of these units were well dressed, some had flag twirlers, and all had banners identifying their school. I think I saw the MST band---I’m not sure. They were dressed in green sweatshirts. There weren’t very many of them and they carried no banner to identify themselves. I’m not blaming the band members. They are the messengers. I was really disappointed. MST is a university that is trying to get name recognition. A university looking for recognition needs to address things like a rag-muffin marching band. Take a look around administrators. Would the university in Columbia put representatives like this in a parade? I think not.

Following the parade, the reenactment of the original St. Pat’s was held at Norwood Hall. If you were a couple of minutes late, you missed it. I was there and have it on film. The reenactment was sorely lacking in breadth and depth. I hope that no one devoted practice to this event because it would have been a waste of time.

St. Pat and his entourage traveled down Pine St. and then turned to Norwood Hall. After the group arrived in front of the steps, St. Pat got off his chariot, strode up the steps, told the Chancellor (I think he was the chancellor, no one introduced him) to kneel, knighted him, turned to the relatively small audience, told them to kneel, knighted them, and then said, “That’s it”. Only a few minutes had expired. Can you believe it? Needless to say, I was stunned. One hundred years of history enacted in a couple of minutes. Are you kidding? I really felt bad for the former St. Pat’s members in attendance. These are the people who are the main stay of the St. Pat’s tradition. I really thought there would be a little more dialog and perhaps some narration. In any event, you wouldn’t have heard any of it because the speakers that were mounted on either side of the Norwood Hall steps were never turned on.

This was the 100th anniversary of a major event in MSM-UMR-MST history---100 years. Where was the student participation? If this was the effort put into this historic event, I can’t imagine what future St. Pat’s will look like.

If the coordinator of this event were living in the working-world as many of us are, he surely would have been called to task, if not outright fired. I know I would have been if I were responsible for this project. I hope I’m wrong, but if the St.Pat’s tradition is to continue it needs some serious help. This help has to come from several venues including the administration, alumni and above all, the student organizations.

Maybe I expected too much. Amen.

Larry Mikelionis
UMR – Class of 1967

Larry,

While I share some of your sentiment, I think there are many other factors at play that impacted the overall celebration. All hope is not lost, IMO.

First, "Gonzo and Games" is no longer the event that you or I remember, nor has it been for a long time. Due to some of the issues in the late 80s and early 90s, the St. Pat's Board was severely restricted. One of the unfortunate consequences was a severe limitation on what was originally dubbed "Extravaganza and Games." For several years the events were hosted at the Fraternity Row fields, though apparently a decision was made to occasionally host them at the Multi-Purpose building. In some years, weather would have forced this issue for the better, though the decision was made to move them this year well in advance of any inclement weather predictions (which turned out quite nice both Thursday and Friday, I should add). As a result, there's not a whole lot of reason to attend other than to earn points towards the St. Pat's competition. Sad, yes, but not a surprise given the general march towards more responsible students, the inevitable fallout of the "Animal House" depiction many Fraternities (college life in general) earned during the hard-party years so long ago.

Another problem for the 100th is related to the overall stability of Fraternities in general. Fraternities were, in the past, largely responsible for the more elaborate floats in the parade. Fraternities are hurting now, compared to a decade ago. When I was a student (90 grad), my Fraternity had 50 members and was one of the smaller houses. 50 members is now a large house, and mine, even more sadly, is down to 18. The St. Pat's Board is also suffering with less than a dozen junior reps, and only a few more senior reps. The baby rep class is small this year as well. Less members equates to less-impressive display.

With regard to the re-enactment, it was not intended to be 100 years of history, it was intended to be a re-enactment of the first St. Pat's knighting, which was then a small affair. Could they have done better? I don't know, I did not attend since I was wiped out from such an early morning (I am a street-painting St. Pat's Board alumni).

Overall, I had a good time, though I agree there seems to be some apathy on campus. Perhaps the time of grandiose celebrations has passed, and all we'll have left is our memories. I can't say for sure that this is campus-wide, but I saw it in my house, and many others, and the general "feel" I used to get from a St. Pat's weekend was certainly different this time.

Perhaps the pendulum will swing the other way in the future. :)

Mark