Seven years later, another secretary of state spoke at Commencement. Gen. George C. Marshall found the occasion propitious enough to announce his celebrated Marshall Plan for the revitalization of Europe in the wake of wartime devastation.
Last year the alumni procession lasted 50 minutes, 20 minutes longer than scheduled. "The trouble spot was in front of Widener. People squeezed into one lane," Aloian, who serves on the Happy Committee, says. "This year, we'll aim for a crisper start to the parade, better movement, and wider lanes. We're going to try to keep the walkway wide--three abreast--to break the Widener bottleneck," he adds.
Aloian concedes that since the procession is led by the oldest mobile alumni, the Happy Committee can only speed up the parade to a limited extent. But the Happy Committee does prepare for unfortunate contingencies. As Gray says, "There's always a doctor who watches the head of the parade."
With the crowds at recent Commencements swelling to record numbers, the aides and marshalls under the jurisdiction of the Happy Committee have had to be more forcible in keeping the general public out of reserved seats. "The aides are not really trained in crowd control. But they try to do the most polite job possible," Aloian says.
The rhythm of Commencement in the spring of 1970 was broken by the appearance of a group of community activists seeking to disrupt the normally staid proceedings, to draw attention to Harvard's expansion in the Riverside area of Cambridge. Led by Saundra Graham--later elected a city councilor--the "counter-commencement" group was allowed to speak its piece after last minute behind-the-scene bargaining.
As rain poured down on observers two years ago, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn used the Commencement podium to launch a biting diatribe at the West's value structure. The voice of the interpreter blended with the Nobel Prize winner's producing a grating effect and making listening difficult. But his words rang out far beyond the confines of the Tercentenary theater; a rebuttal from Rosalynn Carter and mixed public and press reaction were not long in coming.
Against the historical backdrop, each Commencement seems fleeting. The caps and gowns and top hats and sashes, the remnants from the days of Thomas Aquinas, the pomp and splendor and complacency and controversy combine to create an image of both continuity and peculiarity. Captain George Walsh of the Harvard police, who has witnessed the last 30 Commencements, lends perspective to this intangible double-life: "Every one is just as great as the next, but every one is a little different from the last." And today will probably bear out Walsh's maxim; the legacies of the past will melt together with the particular character of 1980. With the help of the Happy Committee, of course.