Mar 16 2009
The Long Gray Line
Any body out there ever hear of the Long Gray Line? Just how long is it? Where was it drawn?
Never mind. I’ll Google it.
Oh, here it is. It’s the title of a 1955 drama directed by John Ford. The phrase “The Long Gray Line” is used to describe, as a continuum, all graduates and cadets of the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York.
I reckon that’s a pretty long line - starting with the first official graduate of the academy, Joseph Gardner Swift and extending all the way to the lowliest plebe (that’s a freshman for you civilians) surviving there today.
I was just wondering because this is the anniversary of the day President Thomas Jefferson signed a law establishing this superb educational institution and leadership factory. The U.S. Military Academy was born in 1802 on this date.
West Point came into being during a time when higher education was available only to the rich. Those who could afford tuition for college were usually admitted wherever they applied. Things were different at West Point. Admission to the U.S. Military Academy was based on merit - regardless of economic station.
The Long Gray Line has provided the military leadership that has seen us through some hard times. General Ulysses S. Grant fought against tough opposition from fellow graduates such as Generals Robert E. Lee and James Longstreet before he finally defeated the Confederacy and preserved the union in 1865. West Pointers MacArthur and Eisenhower led U.S. forces to victory against Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany eighty years later.
West Point has produced leaders for the corporate world and academia as well, including Jim Kimsey, founder of AOL, Jim Hicks, president of JC Penny, Alden Partridge, founder of Norwich University, and Oliver O. Howard, founder of Howard University.
West Point’s motto stands as solid as its reputation:
Duty, Honor, Country.
