Letter from James Pickens Walker Jr. at Washington and Lee, on Southern Collegian letterhead, 1 February [1933]
Book 2, Page 130 ·1933
Transcription
A typewritten letter on printed letterhead of The Southern Collegian, the Literary Journal of Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Va., founded 1866. The masthead names:
THOMAS J. SUGRUE, Editor H. GRAHAM MORISON, Business Manager
Dated at upper right:
1st Feb.
Dear Dad,
You do’nt know how much I appreciate your sending me the money for my initiation to Sigma. It’s a fine organization and without your help I surely bound’nt [sic — typewriter slip for “couldn’t”] have afforded it. At the Assembly last Wednesday I was tapped Omicron Delta Kappa which is the biggest honor on the campus, being awarded for outstanding leadership. A special edition of the paper is put out on that day which I’ll show you some time—enclosed you will find an editorial showing just what this organization means to a W&L man. Of course ODK also involves an initiation fee and it seems that the bigger the honor the bigger the fee. But I am not going to let you furnish this one. I know how things are and I realize that you are having a devil of a time making out at all, much less paying for my collegiate honors. What I want you to do is to let me draw some money out of my savings account. I know that it’s not a good idea to dissapate [sic] this fund, but being initiated to O.D.K. means an awful lot to me now and I know that it will later too. I
AI Notes
First page (of two) of a typed letter on printed letterhead of The Southern Collegian, the literary journal of Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Va., founded 1866. Masthead names Thomas J. Sugrue as Editor and H. Graham Morison as Business Manager. The letter is dated ‘1st Feb.’ at upper right, no year — internal evidence (the swim-meet results on the continuation p131 against William & Mary, George Washington, and Virginia, plus a forthcoming meet against Duke and Johns Hopkins) places it in the W&L 1932–33 swim season; combined with the O.D.K. tapping ceremony, the date is 1 Feb 1933 (his senior year). James Pickens Walker Jr. (b. 5 Jan 1912 per the p629 pedigree) writes to his father James Pickens Walker Sr. (‘Dad’) in Jacksonville, FL, to report that he has been tapped Omicron Delta Kappa — W&L’s senior leadership honor (the society was founded at W&L in 1914) — and to ask permission to draw funds from his savings account to cover the initiation fee. He had previously been initiated into Sigma (Phi Beta Sigma or perhaps Sigma Society — context unspecified), the fee for which his father paid. [this page also pairs with p046 in this album, which is a 1901 W&L varsity-football team photograph captioned ‘Jamie — Pickens Walker — Full back varsity team — Washington & Lee Univ. 1901 — 1901–1903.’ That photo identifies the addressee ‘Dad’ of the present letter — James Pickens Walker Sr. — as himself a W&L man (fullback on the 1901–03 varsity football team), explaining why his son enrolled there a generation later. Two corrections in this page’s body: ‘I surely bound’nt have afforded it’ is the original typewriter slip on the page (the writer fumbled the keys for ‘couldn’t’ — [sic]); ‘dissapate’ (sic) for ‘dissipate.’]
Letter continues on page 131.
The writer is the compiler’s son James Pickens Walker Jr. (“Bo”), then a senior at Washington and Lee. Omicron Delta Kappa — the national college leadership honor society he was just tapped into — had been founded at W&L on 3 December 1914 and was, by the early 1930s, the most prestigious senior recognition on the W&L campus.