UMUC - European Division - Mason G Daly - Mrs. Ann R. Reed Farewell Luncheon - August 29 1967

Europe;Hoffmann, RosemaryAnn has confessed that this was not altogether a surprise luncheon. This was because so many of us have been probing, asking too many questions. That may be the case, but we haven’t come up with many of the answers about the future plans of Mrs. Ann R. Reed. With the announcement that Shirley Temple is running for Congress for California I am tempted to cable her that we have a campaign manager to suggest, a California woman of real efficiency and organization. And surely Shirley needs help if she is starting her campaign with the slogan, “All the way with LBJ has gotten us in the shape we are in today.” This woman, Mrs. Ann Reed, is keeping her future plans from us; she has also managed, I have discovered, to keep some of her past from us. After being her colleague for only sixteen years, I have just learned that she isn’t really Ann Reed at all, that she comes from an historic and colorful background which carries with it another name altogether. She may have been Ann R. Reed to us, but she is to her California associates and her family and certain artistic circles around the world, Rebecca Sargent, near relative of the late, great painter and portraitist, John Singer Sargent. We have here a portrait that won’t match those of John Singer Sargent, Ann, but it is a portrait that catches you at your best, we feel, shows you in the setting and at the work which engaged you so long with us. It should never hang on the walls of your home right alongside any water colors or portraits your family may have of the great Sargent, but you should find a place where it can remind you occasionally of an important segment of your life. We say “Auf Wiedersehen” to our greatest and most organized world-traveler, a woman who we know is charting new trips and travels; we say goodbye to the woman who has admitted over one half million Americans to our classes in her 16 years as director of admissions; we say goodbye to a woman who has become a legend of efficiency and devotion to duty. Now, before you open this gift from the division, Ann, you must submit to the traditional song. The last go at the song was rendered by a trio we called “Poison Gas.” That group mercifully expired. Today it is a quartet which we shall call “The Reedsmen” Maryland my Maryland Your office knew no nicotine, Maryland my Maryland All had their fits in the latrine, Maryland my Maryland. Unlike your colleagues down the hall Who had their alcoholic ball, Your office knew no booze at all, At Maryland my Maryland. In smokeless air the girls did breed Maryland my Maryland In spite of pulls from Mrs. Reed, Maryland my Maryland. Distaffers had their nightly joys You did not like their family ploys, And now you have some pregnant boys, Maryland my Maryland. The trips you took for work and play, Maryland my Maryland. Your camera clicking all the way Maryland my Maryland. The slides you took were mighty shrewd All Roman statues in the nude The Dean himself thought they were lewd. Maryland my Maryland You traveled far, you traveled wide, Maryland my Maryland. Admissions folders at your side Maryland my Maryland. From Istanbul to Chateauroux, All students you would interview, And when you leave what will I do At Maryland my Maryland. And now you’re going ‘way out west Maryland my Maryland. Where you’ll enjoy a well earned rest From Maryland my Maryland. So as you take your leave today May joy and fortune go your way And should you think of us, just say Maryland my Maryland