War on the Horizon

Screen Shot 2018-12-04 at 7.44.20 PM.png

Senior Cadet Stephen W. Graham pictured in the 1917 edition of Taps. (Clemson Special Collections and Archives) 

Screen Shot 2018-12-05 at 11.43.52 AM.png

Captain J.C. Minus, Clemson College's Commandment leader who expressed severe concern about the path of the educational institution in a letter to The State newspaper. (Clemson Special Collections and Archives)

By 1915, Clemson College had developed a negative reputation nationally concerning disciplinary problems. According to the letter written to South Carolina’s newspaper The State, Commandment J.C Minus had voiced serious concerns about the direction of Clemson College’s administration efforts.[1] President Walter Riggs worked to dismantle the disciplinary influence of the Board of Trustee members, whom often were sympathetic to the cause of the cadets. It wasn’t until the United States drew closer to war in Europe that Clemson boys became genuinely concerned with their role in national defense. The April 11th, 1917 edition of the Clemson College newspaper, The Tiger read “Senior Class Volunteers” Cadet Stephen W. Graham organized a meeting in which “it was unanimously agreed, and a resolution was passed to the effect that the services of the Senior Class…be offered to the United States in any capacity that the Government sees fit.”[2] Here a cultural transition that was taking place around the South can be seen on Clemson College’s campus. As the United States entered the Great War in Europe against the Central powers, the South began a reconciliation with the rest of the United States. In 1917, thousands of men from the South and fifty-four Clemson cadets were called into service. Senior Cadet M.M. Brice wrote the following in the May 2nd, 1917 edition of The Tiger:

But some we may never see again…To part with our classmates forever. And then, when you’re serving for flag and your country / In no matter what land or scene, / We will know you are holding aloft the high honor / Of Clemson and old “Seventeen.”[3] 

For the first time since its creation, Clemson College cadets felt the ‘lost cause’ slowly shift into the background as the boys of Clemson answered the call of duty on behalf of the United States government and her people.

[1] “Columbia. The State

[2] University, “The Tiger Vol. XII No. 23 - 1917-04-11.”

[3] Reel, The High Seminary, 203.