UK HOMECOMING 1963, "ALL FOULED UP!"

UK Homecoming 2019 seems to have been a great success.  Good weather, a football victory with our wide receiver at quarterback, and a new Homecoming Queen and King.

President John Oswald crowns Julie Ritchey Homecoming Queen, 1963
Photo: The Kentuckian

Homecoming 1963 did not turn out as well.  First, UK lost to Georgia 14-17 in route to a 3-6-1 season in front of 30,000 fans at an unseasonably warm Stoll Field.  Second, UK's "Marching 100" band apparently consisted of only 80 members!

However, the biggest mistake that day was President John Oswald crowning Julie Ritchey Homecoming Queen at halftime rather than Vivian Shipley.  Apparently, President Oswald was given the wrong name and, according to the Kentucky Kernel, "once the mistake was made, nobody knew just what to do."  Both Ritchey and Shipley "registered mild shock. Assisting with the ceremony were two UK cheerleaders "who had counted the votes and knew who the winner was supposed to be."

The announcement of the correct queen, Vivian Shipley, was not made until well into the third quarter of the game when Julie and Vivian switched roles along the sideline.  Shipley told the Kernel, "I just didn't know what to do, so I just decided the most graceful way out was to smile and be crowned first attendant.  It was a funny feeling to watch them crown someone else, and terribly embarrassing.  It is just one of those things that you don't believe will ever happen, at least not to you."

Vivian Shipley's reactions as she finally learns she is the Homecoming Queen for 1963
Photo: The Kentuckian

The homecoming day was saved by the official dedication ceremony for the Helen G. King Alumni House located on Rose Street across from the stadium that, by all reports, went very well.  New UK President John Oswald officiated at the ceremony which was also attended by former UK presidents Dr. Frank Dickey and Dr Herman Lee Donovan.

Vivian Shipley

Vivian Shipley is now a distinguished poet!  Following college and graduate school, she has had an outstanding career as a writer and teacher and is a member of the UK Hall of Distinguished Alumni.

UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY FOUNDERS DAY

February 22, 2019 marks the University of Kentucky's 154th birthday.  To celebrate the conclusion of UK's centennial celebration in 1966, the university invited then UN Ambassador Arthur Goldberg to speak at the Founders Day Convocation and to receive an honorary degree.

Ambassador Arthur Goldberg receiving honorary degree from the
University of Kentucky at the 1966 Founders Day Convocation.


Prior to becoming ambassador in 1965, Goldberg served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1962 to 1965.  Ambassador Goldberg said that he left the court and accepted the UN appointment, in part, to help bring an end to the devastating war in Vietnam.  At the UK convocation, Ambassador Goldberg noted that the "national debate on America's Vietnam policy has shown a remarkable consensus.




Ambassador Arthur Goldberg speaking at a press conference prior to the Founders Day Convocation.  Left to right, Governor Edward T. "Ned" Breathitt, Ambassador Goldberg, and UK President John Oswald.

But on the UK campus in February 1966 there seemed to be little consensus.  Protests and counter protests marred Ambassador Goldberg's visit to UK as anti-war picketers in front of Memorial Coliseum were pelted with eggs.  According to the Kentucky Kernel:

"The pickets, many of them members of the campus Students for a Democratic Society, were surrounded by approximately 200 onlookers shortly after they began their protest about 1:30 p.m. Just before 2 p.m., students with eggs concealed in their pockets infiltrated the crowd, and the barrage began.  Shells cracked on the heads, clothes, and signs of the picketers, oozing yellow yolk and sticky white. Most of the missiles broke on the sidewalk, as the throwers sacrificed accuracy for anonymity."

Just six months after his UK visit, anti-war protesters in Chicago reminded a national television audience during the Democratic Convention that "the whole world is watching."  Ambassador Goldberg left his post at the UN in 1968 before achieving his goals regarding Vietnam.  What was at the time America's longest war would not officially end until 1975.

BLACK STUDENT UNION, 1968

President John Oswald described the UK campus in 1968 as a state of ferment.  Free speech, anti-war protests, the women's movement, and student rights issues consumed the campus.  But the push by African-American students for a range of issues needing attention and change was at the forefront of the ferment because of its historical antecedents and its impact on the university's future.

UK President John Oswald and BSU President Theodore Berry

The UK Black Student Union, founded in January 1968 and led by its first president, Theodore Berry, became the focus of the movement on campus.  On February 15 the BSU met with President John Oswald to state their goals.  The BSU called for more black students at UK, as well as more black professors, administrators, and staff.  Noting the difficulty of recruiting black professors because of UK's "white image," the BSU argued that black faculty needed to be "actively recruited by UK in order to get them to come here."  President Oswald agreed emphasizing that "UK should make a greater effort to recruit Negro teachers on a personal basis."

The BSU also demanded an end to off-campus housing discrimination.  Even though the university maintained a list of housing that did not discriminate by race, incidents of discrimination remained.

A course in African-American history became central to BSU's call for action.  Not only did the UK History Department not offer such a course, Professor Carl Cone, History Department Chair, attended the February meeting to say that he would "not recommend that the course be included in its curriculum for the next year."

Cone argued that "the course was too specialized for general interest."  This was a History Department that among its regular curriculum taught two courses on Japanese history; one to 1600 and another from 1600 to the present that likely did not have "general interest!"  He did concede that an existing course in American history "would be broadened to include more about the American Negro."

Cone's comments received a "dubious reaction" from the audience.  The BSU presented Cone a petition signed by 900 UK students stating their interest in a black history course.  In 1968 only 150 African-American students attended UK.

In its reporting on the meeting between President Oswald and the BSU the Kernel identified the organization as a "militant Negro group."  Responding to the label Theodore Berry pushed back saying, "If militant means speaking up for what is rightfully ours without asking, then we are militant, but not in a sense of violence."

But events during 1968 moved at a frantic pace. Assassinations took the lives of Dr. Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy creating unrest and uncertainty across the nation.  President Lyndon Johnson announced that he would not run for re-election and Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1968.

Locally, President Oswald left UK in April precipitated by disagreements with Kentucky Governor Louie Nunn and other politicians over free speech and other university policies.  Jim Embry replaced Theodore Berry as presidents of the Black Student Union.

In October 1968 the once recalcitrant Professor Cone announced that a new course in Negro history would be available for the spring 1969 semester.  The course, to be taught by white professor Steven Channing, "will be offered at least once every year and will be open to about 100 students."

Jim Embry, 1968

Cone noted that his change of heart resulted from a change nationally in the history profession in the previous eight to nine months that now considered a black history course a relevant part of the curriculum.

Noting the BSU's long advocacy for such a course, BSU President Jim Embry reacted by noting that, "Our asking for the black history course last spring is now showing its effects.  It should have been done in the first place.  My elation is not that great, but I am glad it's going to be started."

The University of Kentucky owes a debt to Theodore Berry, Jim Embry and many others who forced the university to be more progressive in regard to race and diversity.  Over the past five decades much progress has been achieved but much more remains to be done.  Black History Month is a time to reflect and reaffirm UK's commitment to diversity but the effort must continue throughout the year.