 Author's Program Note. When you're a Scot like I am, you know there is at the heart of our national story a great sadness for if we are to prosper and live well, we are forced to leave the most beautiful land on Earth, grand, poetic, family loving, a place of intellect, learning, quick wits and laughter... for there is no one who laughs like a Scotsman, not dour at all but not quick to share with just anyone. Centuries of treachery made that caution necessary. And so the story of Scotland is the story of loss and people pulled apart, never to meet again and to lament one's whole life for all that one has lost and shall never regain this side of Heaven. My family, of the Clan MacMillan, knew all this only too well. And so an ambitious Scotsman named Daniel MacMillan left his native land in the middle of the eighteenth century to embrace a new destiny in the South Carolina Colony, a land of endless promise where everyone was new, hard-working, undeterred by any obstacle, beholden to no one. Unsurprisingly many of these people were Scots, usually mis-called Scotch-Irish (for scotch is a drink, not a people). Andrew Jackson, in time the Great Republic's 7th president, was one of them... and his feistiness and choler were hallmarks of the entire breed. They took guff from no one... not least the Crown of England. And so in due course when that Crown decided to meddle and the proud settlers decided it would be constrained from doing so, Daniel MacMillan joined his friends and neighbors in a war they would rather not have had but were determined to win if they must fight. Daniel was a citizen-soldier, distinguished at the Battle of Cowpens (January 17, 1781)... and because of my valiant ancestor I became a Son of the American Revolution... the true nobility of the nation. I vowed I would go see that land that bred such righteous folk, and thus was I determined to go to Scotland, sooner rather than later. Dr. Clark Kerr's study abroad program for the University of California's most meritorious students made it possible. And so, in 1967, this proud descendant of impoverished exiles came home. Yes, unlike the other students who were studying abroad... I matriculated at the proudest university of my homeland (founded 1413). I had come home at last and nothing about my experience there was foreign. And so just three weeks after my arrival, I submitted myself as a candidate for the Students Representative Council for the Faculty of Arts... and so became, and by a landslide, too, the elected representative of the largest faculty of the university, the first American citizen ever so elected, ever so honored. Now what? I was determined to do good and leave a sterling record behind, but how? Especially given that I had only 8 months at my disposal before returning to the University of California. It was a tall order...just my style. Challenge is my metier. "But where does he go?" It goes without saying that students at the most traditional of universities are the most traditional people of all. Conservative to the core, they desire to be perceived as the cutting edge, without the bother and intense application needed to shape current and coming events. To be thought liberal, even progressive, was desirable but too much labor altogether. Thus to have me thrown into their ranks, and as representative for the largest faculty of all, proved most unsettling, because I was a man of energy, ideas, determination; in short an American, no respecter of persons or anything else. I came, after all, from Revolutionary stock. My elected colleagues greeted me as a curiosity, something acknowledged and forgotten, the odd duck. But even the most unwelcoming were aware that I was entitled to head a committee and so shape student and university policy. But which committee had the least power, prestige and authority? And so by general consent I was made chairman of the Rectoral Inauguration. Deemed a thing of no importance; I turned it into the cynosure of every eye, an event in which every member of the university could participate. Rector-Elect Sir Learie Constantine aided and abetted me. And so first a working relationship, then a friendship ensued between two most unlikely people, I believe to the joy and satisfaction of each. Sir Learie Nicholas Constantine, Baron Constantine (21 September 1901-1 July 1971). Sir Learie Constantine (he was elevated to Baron in 1969) was a man of many parts; West Indian cricketer, lawyer, and politician who served as Trinidad's High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and became the first U.K. black peer of the realm. Fanciers of this most English of sports called him the champagne of the game, elegant, restrained, lithe, lyric, a natural champion, a credit to the game, always a gentleman. I came to know him well because my erstwhile SRC colleagues thought the job of arranging the ceremony and events of no consequence but neither Constantine nor I agreed. Having won the tri-annual election as Lord Rector of the University, the students representative on the governing board, he did not deem it a paper honor but a job of real importance and influence. In short, he meant to make a difference... and I was determined to get him off to the best possible start. "Vote for Connery!" My friendship and association with Sir Learie and his charming wife Lady Constantine might so easily have never happened, that one is forced to summon fate as the likely option. I might never have run, never been elected, never selected to head the rectoral celebrations. And never have been approved by Constantine for the job, given the fact that I was campaign manager for actor Sean Connery's run for Rector. I backed Connery because he promised to provide the university with an Olympic- sized pool if he won, and so I did my bit for 007, like Her Majesty the Queen was to do for the London Olympics of 2012. At that point I had never heard of Constantine and knew nothing about the many achievements of his distinguished life. His candidacy was endorsed by the student Conservative Party, and he was the comfortable victor joining an astonishing array of celebrities who had since the Universities (Scotland) Act of 1858 served the students of St. Andrews as Rector, one of just 4 Scottish universities with the post; Glasgow, Aberdeen, and Edinburgh, the University of Dundee added later. Thus I became that most valuable of people, the man in the know, checking plans and agendas with my new friend Lord Rector Constantine, squiring his wife and ensuring her comfort, and making sure my friends and supporters got all the plums, and the best camera angles, they desired. As for the university, it got a splendid new Rector and the splendid ceremonies appropriate for such a man on such an occasion. As for me, I learned the features of a beatific smile. Clark Kerr sent the warmest possible letter of commendation, noting that my actions were just what he had in mind when he imagined the program. A copy went to Professor Earl Leslie Griggs, UC's man in London, who sent me another turgid letter of frosty approval verging on insult. I couldn't have liked it more. Last word. Before leaving this article, go to any search engine and find "The Bonnie Banks O' Loch Lomond". It is a well-known traditional Scottish tune first published in 1841. It is often played as the final piece of music after an evening of merriment and high revelry. If there is a drop of Scottish blood in your veins, yes even a single drop, you will let fall the blessed tear, tribute to the land and its people, for you are of them and beloved. I prefer the infinitely touching version by John McDermott, wistful, haunting, prayer-like. |
