Many of us have grown up as recipients of that underrated literary genre, the family story, stories that have been handed down from generation to generation as part of our family history. Some of these stories are funny, some sad, and some even tear-jerking tragic. Sometimes, however, in this great canon of family tales a story emerges that is life-changing, a story that becomes a moral compass, helping us as children to define who we will become. Oh certainly, the details of the story may have become blurred over time with the telling and re-telling of it. (You may at this point want to disregard any use of quotation marks in my telling this particular story since I wasn’t there, and the conversations are simply hearsay from an oft- repeated tale.) Whatever the case, even when the details are a bit hazy, the heart of the story is always there, the moral compass consistently pointing us in the right direction. Such is the following story as I have heard it told through the years. Such is my father’s Erskine story.
The year was 1937. My dad, Bowden Powell, was in his junior year at Erskine. His family, like many others of the 1930’s, had been hard hit by the Great Depression, but his parents were determined that he should have a college education. Being a good ARP, my grandmother was also determined that his college diploma should come from Erskine College. By his parents’ adhering to a “bare-bones” life style and by Dad’s obtaining a work scholarship cleaning dorms, including the bathrooms, it seemed in 1937 that their dream and his was about to become a reality. Unfortunately, as is often the case, disaster struck when it was least welcomed. My grandfather, who was a boilermaker on the Southern Railroad, suffered a broken back when a wall in the railroad shop collapsed and fell on him. Unable to continue the strenuous physical demands placed upon a boilermaker, Granddaddy was “laid off the job.” No insurance, no Medicare, no workman’s comp, no welfare, no friends or family to give a handout. Not only was my father not going to see his Senior year at Erskine – cleaning rooms and toilets wouldn’t be enough for that – but the family back in Rock Hill wasn’t sure where their next meal was coming from.
During his junior year of 1937, Dad had been named Editor-In- Chief of the Erskine yearbook, the Arrow. He had already begun work on organizing and setting into motion some new ideas for the 1938 edition of that publication. Realizing that a new editor would have to be appointed because he could not return, he reported to Dr. R.C. Grier’s office, the president of Erskine at the time, to explain why he had to drop out of school. Dr. Grier showed genuine sympathy but made clear to Dad that there was nothing he could do to help him. Many students were having to leave Erskine because of financial difficulties and “the college itself was hanging on by its fingernails, in an attempt to survive.” He was very sorry, but there was absolutely nothing he could do.
Dad shook hands with Dr. Grier, said he understood and would turn over all the work he had done on the Arrow to the new Editor-In-Chief as soon as one was appointed. When he left Dr. Grier’s office that day, Dad, like so many young victims of the Depression, felt downcast and dejected. He had come so close to realizing his dream of a college education, but it was not to be.
A few weeks later, Dr. Grier called Dad back into his office. Obviously the time had come to hand over all his yearbook work to the new editor. Dr. Grier, however, had other plans. As Dad entered his office, Dr. Grier stood up behind his desk. Holding his left hand high in the air, he said, “Bowden, in this hand I have two more work scholarships for you. In addition to janitorial work, you will also be working in the dining room and, of course, a lot of your time will be used up working on the yearbook, so there is a little bit here to compensate for that. Regretfully, all your work scholarships together are not enough to pay the full amount of your expenses during your final year at Erskine, but they will help.” Raising his right hand high in the air, Dr. Grier continued. “In this hand I have a gift from an anonymous benefactor—one who has seen fit to pay the remaining costs of your senior year at Erskine.”
Dad was stunned. “But who ---?”
Dr. Grier motioned for him not to go on. “Your benefactor wishes to remain anonymous, and I have specific instructions never to reveal his or her identity. You must not ask me to do so.” Dr. Grier cleared his throat. “There is one stipulation though. Your benefactor left instructions that, when you could, just pass it on. Do something good for someone else. That’s all – just pass it on.”
And “pass it on” my dad has. The times and ways he has done so are far too numerous to list, but a quick overview of his life will reveal that he kept his end of the bargain. Following his graduation from Erskine, he became a beloved teacher, coach, and assistant principal at Fort Mill High School. And although he was there only four years, (WWII interrupted his career) approximately fifty years after he left, at a high school reunion, some of his students and members of his football team honored him with a cake that read COACH. They had remembered all that he had “passed on” to them.
WWII found him a different kind of teacher. He became an instructor in the Army Air Corp. Recently, over sixty years later, two of his cadets from Palmer Field recognized him, remembering that he had been with them there during those difficult times in our nation’s history.
Following the war, Dad became one of the first Vocational Rehabilitation Counselors in the state of South Carolina. His territory covered, Florence, Dillon, and Marion counties. He didn’t wait for the handicapped to find him and ask for help. He spent countless hours driving the back roads of these agrarian communities seeking out the handicapped himself, seeing that they received as much medical help and job training as possible so that they could become productive citizens and fulfilled as human beings. He won more South Carolina Voc. Rehab. Cases of the Year than any other counselor in the history of that agency. As a child, I remember people stopping on the street or coming by our house to thank him for restoring their lives. I also remember how proud I was during those moments that he was my father. He worked valiantly to provide handicapped parking and handicapped accessibility to buildings. He, with other like-minded citizens, began a Special Olympics program in Florence as well as a Crime Stoppers Association. He assumed positions of leadership in civic organizations such as Jaycees, Civitans, and Gideons. He remained active in the Erskine Alumni Association serving as co-chairman of the Living Endowment Campaign and always looking forward to attending Erskine class reunions as long as he was able. He gave endless hours and substantial amounts of money to the church he loved, serving in every capacity known to church folks. Oh the battles he fought so that people in nursing homes, hospitals, and jails might worship via their televisions with a local church on Sunday mornings. When the bells in the church steeple stopped ringing, he paid for them to be repaired. Yes, he “passed it on.” He passed it to me and my sisters, giving us a secure and loving home and modeling for us what a good husband should be in his open adoration and respect for our mother. He taught us the value of a dollar, insisting that we always share what we had with others and admonishing us when necessary for wasting resources (don’t dare leave the cap off the toothpaste). Indeed, Dr. Grier, he “passed it on.”
Upon Dad’s retirement in 1981, he was given the Key to the City of Florence, a city that was all the better for his having called it home. Additionally, a scholarship for handicapped students was established in his honor at Francis Marion University, a living tribute acknowledging his work with handicapped people. Certainly these accolades were well-deserved, but I couldn’t help wondering if the behaviors that earned them were begun in 1937 when a generous, secret benefactor gave my dad a mystery gift, asking only that he “pass it on” in return.
For too many years, especially as a child, I dwelt on the mystery aspect of this story. Who could have been my dad’s benefactor? Why did the person not reveal himself or herself to him? Didn’t Dad have a right to know so he could say thank you? Perhaps it was a professor, or the parent of a friend whose family was a little better off than most in 1937. Maybe, just maybe, it was Dr. Grier himself! I used to lie awake at night trying to figure it out. What folly!
You see, I had missed the point entirely by concentrating on the mystery instead of the moral lesson to be learned. At this writing, my dad is ninety-four years of age, and he will never know who his benefactor was. But not knowing doesn’t seem to bother him at all. Unlike his silly daughter, he understood from the beginning that the importance of his Erskine story was not in the “who done it,” but in the “what can I do.” He knew he should use his energies “passing it on,” not waste them on “figuring it out.”
There is an old adage which says that there is not one of us who has not warmed ourselves by someone else’s fire nor drunk from someone else’s well. I think there should be an addendum to that adage. I think that the addition should say that after we have warmed ourselves and quenched our thirst we should, when we are able, build our own fire, inviting others to it, and dig our own well, inviting others to come and drink deeply. We should “pass it on.”
Jeanne Powell White
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