Pacific Celebrates Homecoming 2015 with Flair
“Boxers win! Boxers win!”
Pacific’s dominating 34-7 win over Pacific Lutheran on the gridiron Saturday put a stunning cap on a weekend full of celebration in Forest Grove.
Several hundred alumni, students and friends of the university converged on the Forest Grove Campus for 35 events over the course of three days for Homecoming 2015.
The Class of 1965, celebrating its 50th reunion, made the strongest showing, with about 35 alumni returning to campus to be inducted in the Golden Guard and sign their names in the sidewalk outside Old College Hall.
Classmates were thrilled to see Ron Tammen ’65, who took his political science degree from Pacific into a career in public serving, working for the CIA, legislators, the National War College, and most recently as founding director of the Mark O. Hatfield School of Government at Portland State University.
They caught up with Fran O’Brien ’65, who spent the summer before their senior year in Mississippi, teaching with the Freedom School movement, and who went on to a career teaching special education.
They shouted through the streets of Forest Grove with Pacific University Board of Trustees Chair Mindy (Cottrell) Cameron ’65, joining students with a float in the Friday night Noise Parade. And they sang along as cheerleader-turned-Trustee Cam Perry ’65 and Laura (James) Frye ’65 — who also hosted the class at her home with husband Jerry Frye ’61 — led them in the Pacific fight song over lunch.
They weren’t the only ones having a rollicking weekend, though. Harley Kelley ’55 and Jerry Millis ’55 returned to campus to quietly mark their 60th reunion and laughing as they looked on their own sidewalk marks, signed a decade ago.
More than 20 members of the Class of 2005 came home to show their young families their campus, tailgate and play games before the football game, and reconnect during an evening reunion on Saturday.
Pacific dedicated its new video scoreboard in Hanson Stadium with a special on-field ceremony prior to the game, recognizing the generosity the Phillips and Stanich families, as well as the many people who followed their lead in giving to the fund for the board.
And students gave alumni even more to be proud of, as they donned their red and black, embraced their own Homecoming activities, and made a strong showing on the field.
In addition to the football team’s big win, the volleyball team dealt Whitworth two back-to-back upsets, while the women’s soccer team ended a scoreless deadlock with Linfield with a winning goal in double overtime.
The weekend had its somber moments, too, as alumni remembered friends no longer with us, and students especially took time to acknowledge the violence that occurred earlier in the week at Umpqua Community College. Several Noise Parade floats displayed “Stand with Roseburg” messages, and the Alpha Zeta fraternity closed the parade with a silent float in memory of the tragedy.
Pacific is already looking ahead to next year’s Homecoming celebration, with the induction of the Class of 1966 in the Golden Guard, and celebration of milestone reunions for classes whose graduation years end in -6 or -1. Help get your class together by becoming a reunion volunteer, and mark your calendars for Homecoming 2016, Oct. 14-16.