|
> Photos
May 4, 2007
Three new second lieutenants in the U.S. Army were commissioned Friday, May 4, as Presbyterian College kicked off commencement weekend with its annual Reserve Officer Training Corps commissioning ceremony.
Members of the Scottish Highlander Battalion and PC's Class of 2007 who were commissioned included Matthew Parker of Concord, N.C.; Matthew Reese of Easley, S.C.; and Daniel Stankus of Fairfax, Va.
Parker and Reese also were honored as co-recipients of the Wysor Saber, which is awarded annually to the top cadet in the Scottish Highlander Battalion.
Parker, last year's recipient of the first Capt. Kimberly Hampton Scholarship, majored in business management major and is the son of Richard and Pam Parker of Concord. His first military assignment will be to the 203rd Brigade Support Battalion, 3rd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division at Ft. Benning, Ga.
In addition to being a participant in intramural athletics, he was a member of the varsity basketball team for three years and accepted the team's 2006-07 Blue Heart Award and the 2005-06 Scotsman Club Award. He served as operations officer for the Scottish Highlander Battalion.
Reese, the son of Mike and Cindy Reese of Easley, also will be assigned to Fort Benning. The cadet battalion commander, he earned the George C. Marshall Award presented to the top cadet from each school - PC, Lander University, and Newberry College - represented in the battalion.
Reese also has been an active member of Presbyterian College's Student Government Association, serving as treasurer and orientation chair. He was a member of the college's honor council, president of the inter-fraternity council, and vice president of the Greek leadership society Order of Omega.
Stankus, the son of Bernard and the late Linda Stankus of Fairfax, majored in psychology at PC. He was a member of the varsity baseball team and Alpha Sigma Phi fraternity, and served as cadet logistician for the Scottish Highlander Battalion. His first military assignment will be to the 203rd Brigade Support Battalion, 3rd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division at Fort Benning.
Cadet Cody Mitchell of Bethune, S.C., was the recipient of the 2007 Capt. Kimberly Hampton Scholarship, presented in honor of the late Kimberly Hampton, a 1998 alumna and U.S. Army helicopter pilot who was killed in Iraq while flying reconnaissance near Fallujah. The scholarship was awarded to Mitchell by Hampton's parents, Dale and Ann Hampton of Easley, S.C.
Mitchell, a rising senior, is president of the college's student body.
As it has since 1988, the ROTC program inducted a distinguished soldier and alumnus into its ROTC Hall of Fame. This year's ROTC Hall of Fame inductee was retired U.S. Air Force Col. Thomas Quaite Jones Jr., a 1939 graduate of PC.
A Wysor Saber recipient, Jones served as an instructor pilot during World War II and as an Airborne commander of 18 B-29 aircraft during 15 combat missions during the Korean War. During the height of the Cold War in the late 1950s, Jones also served as a squadron commander of a missile squadron at Bitburg Air Force Base in Germany.
Jones' awards and decorations include the Air Medal, the Air Force Commendation Medal with one Oak Leaf Cluster, the Air Force Outstanding Unit Award, the Air Force Systems Command, the Air Force Longevity Service Award with Silver Oak Leaf Cluster, the United Nations Service Medal, the National Defense Service Medal with one Bronze Star, the Korean Service Medal, the Republic of Korea Presidential Unit Citation, and the Korean War Service Medal.
Jones said he never dreamed he would be back on campus 72 years after graduating but said it was an honor to do so as an ROTC Hall of Fame inductee and to join such a privileged group.
"I was very fortunate to know 10 of the 24 members of this Hall of Fame," he said. "Two of them were my classmates."
In addition to noting the accomplishments of his contemporaries, Jones said he also hopes everyone will take not of today's soldiers.
"I am greatly impressed by the voluntary commitment of our current generation," he said.
So, too, did this year's commission speaker, Brigadier Gen. Rick Porter, a 1978 graduate of PC. Addressing the new Army officers and next year's cadre, he shared his sense of pride in seeing new officers become commissioned.
"It's encouraging to see each year the renewal of the Army," he said. "...But we have to remember, in year's past we had a draft and, in many places, ROTC was compulsory. Yet, for each of these new second lieutenants, you've answered the call of duty through a much different time than in the past. Your participation in ROTC was not mandatory, yet you joined."
The new officers commissioned at PC, he said, also chose to volunteer for military service while the country is at war - proving their full commitment to protecting its freedoms.
In exchange for that commitment, even placing their lives in harm's way, there will also be opportunities - to be trained and educated, to see the world, to lead the "greatest soldiers in the world" and to "join a brotherhood - and a sisterhood - like no other."
Porter said he is confident that today's newest soldiers and officers will not fail.
"The Army has never failed the American people," he said, "and they never will." |
