This segment includes comments on student dress in the 1920s, on desegregation and coeducation, on football, and on the Old Gold and Black. This is the second portion of an interview prepared by students in Dr. Lewis Jones' 1980 Oral History Interim.
This recording is the first eleven minutes of an interview with D. F. Patterson of the class of 1929. Mr. Patterson went on to become chairman of the Wofford Board of Trustees in the 1950s. In this segment, recorded in 1980, he talks with a Wofford student about Spartanburg, memories of the faculty, and the start of his career in banking.
You may have to turn up your volume a bit. I've tried to remove some of the tape recorder noise.
An annual tradition at Wofford and in Spartanburg from the mid-1920s to the 1960s was the presentation of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol by Dr. C. C. Norton, professor of sociology, dean of the college, and one-time acting president of the college. My Wofford Today column is about the many contributions of Dr. Norton to the college in his 40 years as a member of the faculty, so you might want to check that out for some details of his life and work. Sometime in the next few weeks, I'll post some of "Cutie" Norton's caricatures and "Church Folks" cartoons. Since Christmas is this week, and we have recordings of Norton's presentation, I'm posting the introductory track and concluding track – the entire audio would take over 30 minutes. The introduction runs about 2 minutes and 40 seconds, and the conclusion runs about 5 minutes and a half.
This is the introductory portion of Dr. Norton's rendition of A Christmas Carol, performed in 1960 at Wofford College. The concluding portion is below.
This is the concluding section of Dr. C. C. Norton's reading of A Christmas Carol, recorded in 1960 at Wofford College.
Francis Pendleton Gaines became Wofford's 6th president in 1952. In
this selection, he is introduced by Dean of the College C. C. Norton
and talks about his background, the importance of tradition, and the
college's strong reputation. The selection lasts a little over 4
minutes. If you are reading this on a feed reader, you may have to
click through to the website to listen to the sound clip.
In this radio talk, Dr. Henry Nelson Snyder, who was Wofford’s president from 1902 to 1942, talks with WSPA-AM’s Jane Dalton about the American College Commencement. This segment is a portion of his longer radio talk from May 28, 1948. Jane Dalton tells Dr. Snyder that she was invited to give a commencement address at Tucapau, which is known today as Startex, a small town in western Spartanburg County. Dr. Snyder did not give any commencement addresses that year, but while he was president, he was always in demand to give high school and college graduation addresses.
If you are reading this blog entry through a feed reader and you don’t see a link to the sound file, you may need to click through to the from the archives site to actually get to the sound file. The sound clip runs about four and a half minutes.
This is a selection from a radio talk by Wofford’s fourth president, Dr. Henry Nelson Snyder, in 1948. Snyder was one of the five members of Phi Beta Kappa who received the college’s Phi Beta Kappa charter in 1941. Several years after he retired, in 1948 and 1949, he presented a series of weekly radio interviews on Spartanburg’s WSPA-AM, hosted by Jane Dalton, the radio station’s woman’s editor. In this talk, from April 23, 1948, he talks about Wofford’s recent celebration of Phi Beta Kappa day. Since we’re celebrating our annual observance of Phi Beta Kappa day at Wofford today, I thought this would be appropriate to share. This segment runs just under 5 minutes.
David Duncan Wallace, who taught history at Wofford from 1899 to 1947, was in his day the foremost historian of South Carolina. His four-volume History of South Carolina, published in 1935, covers the early history of the state in greater detail than any volume published before or since. He was also the college historian, writing the History of Wofford College that remains the standard source for the college’s early history. He wrote on other topics – the state constitution, the Revolutionary American leader Henry Laurens, and state government.
After he retired from the faculty, Wallace continued to teach and write. In this talk on June 28, 1950, he addressed the Wofford summer teacher’s workshop, and touches on the beginnings of the Korean War, on the meaning of the past, and on South Carolina as a “new old state.” These excerpts run about 6 minutes.
Here’s the finale of the Glee Club’s May 1950 concert, The Battle Hymn of the Republic.
The Glee Club in the 1950s was known throughout the state for their concerts. Led by Professor Sam Moyer, the group made frequent visits to churches and concert halls in South Carolina.
Wofford’s Glee Club concert in May 1950 featured the group’s rendition of the college alma mater. The concert was recorded on an old open-reel recorder, and the tapes preserved in the archives ever since. This year, I’ve been trying to digitize these old recordings, because they won’t last forever on tape.
Thanks to webmaster Kyle James for showing me how to add audio files to the blog. There will be many more sound files to come – including another Glee Club recording and the voices of some Wofford luminaries.