Memories of Sterling Brown

African American Review, Fall, 1997 by Ronald D. Palmer

One rainy evening I observed Sterling Brown quietly standing in the shadows at the back of the Chapel. I couldn't see his face. I hope he was smiling.

The Scroller Song Fest was a great success. We came on last and brought the house down. Harold Banks was the narrator. We sang the songs and spirituals Brown had indicated in the poem. We couldn't win our own event, of course, but we were known thereafter as the 16 Strong Men. While this brought us some celebrity, we subsequently had to prove how strong we were, repeatedly, in the rites of passage which included paddling.

We met all challenges and were initiated on the evening of December 12, 1952. Figure 1 shows the 16 Strong Men looking tired but resolute in white-tie, with shining shoes, in front of the now demolished Clark Hall. The picture was taken the afternoon of December 12 before one last march across the Long Walk to the Kappa Tree.

From right to left the Strong Men were: Billy Smith, James Pittman, Box Bailey, Carver Leach, Bobby Works, Welch Golightly, Bobby Stewart, Billy Cooper, Charlie Reese, John Saunders, Harold Banks, Don Humphries, Verdise Rollins, Victor Furtado, John Daniels, and myself. Billy Smith, Charlie Reese, Billy Cooper, and John Daniels, all of fond memory, are deceased.

Ronald D. Palmer is Professor of the Practice of International Affairs at George Washington University.