Dear Alumni and Friends,

I’ve been asked to write little pieces for Tower, memories about our lives at UD. My problem is that the stories are all mixed up — I truly think of you all being at UD at the same time! Often the story I was about to tell may really have involved your parent, sibling or close friend! You see, I remember the pattern of every school year, every semester, as essentially the same but totally different, always fascinating and rewarding.

So, with that disclaimer, let me share with you some memories of the early days at UD. The very first few freshmen classes remember that there were no trees on the top of the hill. It was pasture land. It had never had much brush and what grew there was cleared regularly. One of my favorite pictures shows the first president, Dr. Kenneth Brasted, looking out over the land with an expression on his face that says, “What have I done?” (He was from the eastern forested part of the United States.)

But, very quickly, little groups of trees were added around the first six buildings. Everyone participated. Sister Frances Marie Manning, English professor and one of the founding Sisters of St. Mary of Namur, helped Father Don Fischer and Professor Lyle Novinski plant trees outside the first chapel, where the drama building now stands. A picture of the three at work occasioned a gift of 500 trees from the Carl B. and Florence E. King Foundation.

Many of you alums helped plant them, as well. The trees were strewn about in front of Carpenter Hall, near Lynch and the first dorms. Without irrigation, students, staff and families watered them over the hot summer with hoses and watering trucks.

But trees take time to grow in order to be noticed. And in the midst of it all, amazing things were happening and buildings were being built, including Gorman Lecture Center, Blakley Library and Maher Athletic Center. The most extraordinary gift was the $7.5M endowment from the Blakley-Braniff Foundation, establishing the Braniff Graduate School just six years after the opening of UD. A longstanding friendship between founder Edward Maher and then-Senator William Blakley encouraged the gift.

A million and a half from that endowment funded the Braniff Building, the Mall and the tower. Of course, classes continued during construction. This made for many experiences of mud and chaos. As Delora Wojehowski said in her 1979 valedictory, “When I arrived, I wondered why my parents sent me to the middle of a brick factory! I now think of the campus as an Italian hill town.”

With the Mall came the Braniff Memorial Tower. One day, at a luncheon thanking the King Foundation for scholarship assistance, and for the trees which had grown to noticeable height, King Scholar Sean Martin asked foundation director Carl Yeckel if he had heard about the bells in the tower. 

“No,” Yeckel said. “What about them?” 
“There aren’t any.”
“Let’s look at that question,” Yeckel chuckled.