The event of Commencement is an old academic ritual but one that has undergone continuous change at Wittenberg.

Although two students completed the requirements for graduation in 1850, one headed for the California gold fields, and the other, J. F. Mitchell, elected to graduate in 1851. Mitchell’s grades enabled him to be the valedictorian of his new class.

Wittenberg’s first Commencement in 1851 was held not in June but in September. On Wednesday, Sept. 10, President Samuel Sprecher delivered the baccalaureate sermon in First Lutheran Church. His subject was “The Duties of Educated Men and the Manner in Which They Should Be Performed.” On Thursday the literary societies met together in the city hall to hear the first of their annual speakers, the Rev. Edwin H. Nevin, D.D., who spoke on “Faith in God —the Foundation of Individual and National Greatness.” On Friday the Commencement exercises were held in the city hall, and each of the eight members of the class delivered an oration and received the A.B. degree. Music was provided by the Independent Sax-Horn Band of Dayton, Ohio, an aggregation that featured the newly invented and, to older listeners, strange-sounding saxophone.

Respect was paid to students of high academic achievement by enlisting them to deliver the various orations of the Commencement. One could tell the achievements of the top scholars of the class by the assignment given each student in the exercises: the valedictorian, salutatorian, Latin orator, Greek orator, English orator, German orator, etc.

As years passed and the graduating classes grew larger, the student orations grew shorter. Eventually only a few select students spoke. Finally no student spoke at all, and an annual visiting speaker became a formal part of the Commencement exercises. The change was a pleasing one to students. The student literary societies had begun the practice of jointly sponsoring an outside speaker several years earlier in order to bring outside personalities of the students’ own choosing to the campus event. The advent of a Commencement speaker thus meant the institutionalizing of the students’ desire for a speaker outside the school’s normal circle and at the same time freed students from the chore of preparing Commencement addresses. With these changes, however, students became increasingly passive observers at an event in which they once performed the major tasks.

The faculty, graduating class and student body used to meet in the First Lutheran Church, from which they were led by a band from High Street, up Main, then to Market (now Fountain), and then to the old market house, where public Commencement exercises took place. In 1869 this procession was abandoned. Exercises were held in the city hall and later in Black’s Opera House and in 1879 were moved to the college grounds. The Class of 1896 sought to add dignity and fame to itself by inaugurating the custom of appearing in caps and gowns. In 1904, at the first Commencement under Dr. Charles G. Heckert, the procession was revived, and faculty, graduates and other participants processed to the campus hillside for Commencement.

Commencement exercises were held in the Springfield city hall from 1851 to 1868; in Black’s Opera House from 1869 to 1878; and in the campus grove, south of Myers Hall and east of Recitation Hall, from 1879 to 1926. Only since 1927 have Commencements been held in Commencement Hollow. In bad weather the event is staged in the Health, Physical Education, and Recreation Center.

Today the event is in many ways a collection of private family celebrations. It is yet a collective event of the academic community but one in an era when academic communities are more diverse and fragmented than in an earlier day. The validity of the exercises as a demonstration of student competence, moreover, has long since been superseded by less public measurements and criteria, and the dimensions of institutional accountability are decidedly different and more complex.

The format and significance with which Commencement will be presented in the years ahead remain to be seen, yet one central factor remains constant. Under the charter of the institution, only the board of directors may grant the student the degree which he or she has earned. This is done by issuing a certificate which “authenticates and perpetuates” the student’s achievements. The faculty recommends, the board of directors confirms, and the president publicly awards the degree, representing the institution’s common action. That is the fundamental meaning of Commencement. As an event that focuses attention upon the primary mission of the institution, it will survive in the ritual of academia so long as it emphasizes that essential meaning.