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PAINE COLLEGE CAMPUS
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Vol. 3
Hundreds Come From Near And Far To Mourn Dr. Pitt;
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Paine Students stood with body all night Thursday night
for public viewing of the remains.
People came (from all parts
of the country to attend the
funeral services of Dr. Lucius
Holsey Pitts, the first Black
Richardson To Serve As
Acting President
B
Dr. Canute Richardson (L) and Dr. Dan Collins
In a special session of the
executive committee of the
Board of Trustees of Paine
College, an acting president
and an Interim Committee
were appointed to administer
the affairs of the College
during the time required to
search for and elect a new
President.
Dr. Daniel A. Collins,
chairman of the board,
announced that Dr. C.M.
Richardson has been appointed
Acting President of Paine
College.
Dr. Collins also appointed
Dr. Richardson to serve as
Chairman of the Interim
Committee. This committee,
under the guidance of the
Acting President will be
responsible for the general
Supplemental Security Income For
The Aged, Blind, And Disabled
The Federal Government will make mon tidy cash
payments starting in January 1974 to people in financial
need who are 65 or older or who are blind or disabled.
The new program will take the placed of the present
Federal-State programs of public assistnace payments to
people who are 65 or older or blind or diabled. But
States will continue to provide them with other services,
. and some States will add to the Federal payment Until
> Federal supplemental security income payments started
in January 1974, State and local public assistance
offices will continue to make payments in the usual
See INCOME on Page 3
NATIONAL BLACK NEWS SERVICE
MEMBER
president of Paine College. It
was an unusual funeral for an
usual man.
Everybody knew that it
operations of the College, also
serving on the committee are:
James M. Hinton, Jr., W. Coye
Williams, Quincy Robertson,
Harry O’Rear, and Charles
SMith.
In other action, the
Executive Committee
appointed a Search Committee
to find possible candidates for
the College Presidency and
present them to the board of
trustees for consideration.
Named to this committee were
James M. Hinton, Jr.,
Chairman, Woodrow Geier,
Evelyn Berry, C.D. Coleman,
Benjamin E. Mays, Dave Mack,
Jr., C.M. Richardson, and
Daniel A. Collins.
Dr. Collins said he expects
that a new president will be
named by the end of June.
P.O. Box 953
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would be a big funeral. Miles
College, where Dr. Pitts was
president for 10 years,
chartered two Trailways buses.
W Editor’s note: “Be A Man John”. This poem was recently written by Dr. PittsJ
■ Pitts to his 19-year-old son as he left to join the Air Force. John Eugene Pitts ■
read both poems during the funeral.
BE A MAN JOHN
BE A MIGHTY MAN
Life ain’t never easy, «
Times may not please ya
But
Be a man John
Be a mighty man.
Mike and Ron say:
“You can’t take it man”
Me and God say, you can!
Be a man John
Be a mighty man.
The General, the Cap’n,
The Sarge and Corporal too
‘Spose to make you mad.
Don’t do it
Be a man John
Be a mighty man.
Come rain or shine
Come spruce or pine
Come those who whine
Come heartaches at times
Be a man John
Be a mighty man
Today looks kinda dark
No sun, no singing lark
The urge to stop to park
Don’t
Be a man John
Be a mighty man.
In trouble with fear
Sometimes a tear
Okay, God says
I’m always near.
The heat and cold
The winds that blow
The rain and shine
Suggest you blow
Don’t
Be a man John
Be a mighty man.
The cheering crowd
The jeers and sneers
Sgt. Andrew D. Waring Sr.
Retired Master Sgt. Andrew
D. Waring, Sr. died Sunday in
the Fort Gordon Hospital.
Mr. Waring won the Bronze
Star medal while serving in
Europe in World War 11. The
award was given for courageous
service. He is among a very few
Augustans to receive this
award.
He was a former assistant
professor of military science
and tactics at Hampton
Institute. He will be buried
with full military honors.
A graduate of Haines
Institute and Hampton
Institute, he was a former
acrilite at St. Mary’s Episcopal
The Augusta Chapter of the NAACP will meet
Monday night March 11th at 7:30 P.M. at the
Tabernacle Baptist Church.
The Able-Disabled will meet Tuesday, March 19th
at 7:30 P.M. at the Georgia War Veterans Home,
1101 15th Street in Augusta, across from the
Talmadge Hospital. For more information call
(279-0979. Thank!
n TOE PEOPLE’S PAPER
/
Honorary pallbearers. News-Review staff photos by Frank Bowman
Nearby hotels were booked
solid days in advance of the
funeral.
Many persons wanting seats
The hidden fears
Say:
Tell 'em to go *+%f**i!
Grab bag and go AWOL
Don’t
Be a man John
Be a mighty man
MY FATHER
My father was strong,
My father was weak,
He helped everyone
Even in his sleep.
There were days of toil and strife
And even in the midst of
All of this my father seemed
To be a beacon of Jight.
My father was smart
My father was bright;
He was the greatest
In my eyesight.
He had it all
From rags to riches,
From brains to canes
And wished man
Had the same.
He taught the poor
He taught the rich;
But he taught us all
How to use good sense.
All in all when trouble
Called we cpuld count on
Him not to let us fall.
He walked with pride
From day to day;
And even now I can
Hear him say:
Be strong, young man.
Be strong.
Church.
He is the son of the late J.B.
and Annie Lou Waring.
Survivors include his wife,
Nellie E. Waring; a son,
Andrew Waring 11, of Fort Sam
Houston, Texas; a daughter,
Mrs. Anni Lou Waring,
(Boston); two brothers, J.
Philip Waring (St. Louis) and
Lewellen Waring (San Mateo,
Calif.).
Funeral services will be held
Thursday at 11:00 at St.
Mary.s Espicopal Church with
Rev' J.B. Burlin officiating.
Burial will be in the Cedar
Grove Cemetery.
William and Dotson Funeral
Home is in charge.
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in the chapel arrived three
hours early for the noon
funeral. The only seats
available were in the transepts,
[ EDITORIAL
Lucius Holsey Pitts
One of the most striking qualities of the funeral of
Dr. Luckis Pitts was the inexplicable air of joy that
surrounded it. One jjerson was heard to describe it as a
“glorious/ occasion.
The feelings of sorrow seemed to have been
overshadowed by the feeling that Augusuta and Paine
College had been fortunate to have had the benefit of
his presence, wisdom, courage and leadership for three
years.
Dr. Pitts came to Paine College at a time when there
was talk that the college might have to close down.
Monday, Dr. Daniel Collins, president of Paine’s board
of trustees, said that the college has never been in better
shape (in all departments) than it is at this moment.
Dr. Pitts came to Augusta at a time when race
relations were severely strained, and much of the white
business community held Paine College responsible lor
serving as a brain trust for the 1970 riot. As a result of
Dr. Pitts’> ability to put things in tueir proper
perspective, many of those same businessmen are now
leading the college’s “Build It Back” campaign.
Brother Lucius will be remembered for his
extraordinary charisma. Possessed with a brilliant mind,
he was articulate and could talk anybody out of, or
into, anything he wanted. A prominent white
businessman who had heard Dr. Pitts speak for the first
time remarked, “He knows how to handle people, I
mean white people.” Dr. Pitts has been called both a
militant and an Uncle Tom. He would not disown either
label He recently revealed to tiie Paine College faculty
the title of a book he planned to write. The title was to
have been “Thank God For Uncle Tom, ‘Cause He Was
A SMART Nigger.”
Dr. Pitts was a SMART man, and if by chance he at
times appeared to be tomming, he wasn’t. He was
manipulating. He was not being controlled, he
controlled.
His faith in God was total. He would sometimes make
remarks such as, “We’ve just written .$100,000.00 worth
of checks. And I’ve got to come up with that
$100,000.00 before Monday morning. But I’m not
worried about it. Why? Because my Father loves me,
andlle controls all things.”
New York Times Editorial Eulogizes
Dr. Pitts As ’Miracle Worker’
It was in the fall of 1969. Black and white student leaders were
facing each other in open hostility at a national meeting in
Washington, and the mood had reached the brink of violence. A
tall Black man rose from the sidelines. “Frustrated?” he asked,
pointing to the angry Black youths. “Yes, I’m frustrated, too ..
And these are my children.” When Dr. Lucius Pitts, then
president of Miles College in Birmingham, Ala., sat down, the
combination of a preacher’s emotion and a philosopher’s reason
had miraculously established peace.
Dr. Pitts, who died this week at the age of 59, had been an
educational miracle worker all his life. But this seventh son of a
Georgia tenant farmer had not been widely known until he agreed
in 1960 to assume the presidency of Miles College, a disaccredited
and bankrupt institution engulfed in an atmosphere of virulent
white supremacy. Less than a decade later, Miles was a going
enterprise, its accreditation restored. Dr. Pitts moved on up shore
to Paine College in Augusta, Ga., his own alma mater.
In 1971, when fiscal disaster threatened all private Black
colleges, Dr. Pitts issued a desperate appeal: “I am asking as a
Black college president . . . should I throw in the towel?” Once
again, he helped build understanding and Lucius Pitts
never threw in the towel- not on the dreams of “his children”
nor on the larger future of an integrated America.
(Reprinted from the New York Times)
Augusta, Georgia
the balcony or other rooms
including the 200 seat odeum
where they could view the
proceedings via closed circuit
television.
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Dr. ntts was buried next to the raine College Chapel. He
is the first person to be buried on the campus.
The main seating area was
reserved for the honorary
pallbearers: The Paine College
Student Government
Association official. The Board
of Trustees, the Class of 1941
(Dr. Pitts’ class), clergymen of
the Sixth Episcopal District of
the CME Church, general
officers of the CME Church,
college presidents, the Paine
College faculty and staff, the
Miles College faculty and staff,
Alumni Association officers,
The Greater Augusta Chamber
of Commerce, the
Augusta-Richmond County
Human Relations Commission,
the Human Relations Council
and clergymen of the Christian
Methodist Episcopal Church.
Active Pallbearers were the
Rev. Charles Stokes, Willie
Clyde Jones, L.H. Whelchel,
Jr., James Russell, Horace
Dawson, Charles Clark, Luther
Williams, and Burney Lester.
The body lay in state in the
chapel all night Thursday night
for the public to view the
remains. The casket was closed
just prior to the funeral. Paine
College students rotated shifts
standing with the casket.
The Paine choir set the
tone for the funeral, singing
“Good News” and “A’in A
that Good News”. The funeral,
like Dr. Pitts’, conversation,
was a blend of seriousness and
good-natured humor.
Mayor Lewis A. Newman
spoke of “Brother Lucius” as a
“community welder”. Dr. Pitts
“walked farther and made
deeper footprints across this
city than any man I know of.
Augusta is much richer because
Lucius Pitts walked with us for
three years,” he said.
Dr. Richard Arrington,
Director of the Alabama
Center for Higher Education,
said Dr. Pitts had the ability to
excite people about their own
potential and to make them
believe in themselves. Dr.
Arrington who was a colleague
of Dr. Pitts at Miles College in
Birmingham, Ala., said of Dr.
Pitts’ , impact on Birmingham
and Miles College, “He turned
the city and the college
around. He made a city of
injustice a city of decency. He
made open admissions
respectable, and was
committed to helping Black
people walk proudly in
American society.”
Dr. W. Coye Williams,
academic dean at Paine College
described Dr. Pitts as “A man
who simply said ‘Come Dream
with Me of things that CAN
be.’ ”
Among the most eloquent of
the star studded speakers was
Dr. E. Clayton Calhoun, who
served for 14 years as president
of Paine College, and resigned
in 1970. Dr. Pitts, Calhoun
said, lived into life Frank
Yerby’s words in the Paine
College Hymn < a “unity
of hearts” and “differences be
set at nought between the
white and Black”.
Dr. Pitts, Calhoun
continued, “teased us out of
our stupidity and laughed us
into dreams.”
Emphasizing his faith in God
in a sermon in Miami, Dr. Pitts,
March 7, 1974 No. 51
according to Dr. Calhoun,
illustrated his point by saying
that “No matter how low 1 am,
MY Lord, MY Lord will lift me
up. Even if the Southern white
man is standing with his heel
upon my neck, my Lord will
lift me up.
Following the sermon, Dr.
Calhoun, according to Dr. Pitts,
ran up to him shaking his
finger and said, “Lucius, darn
your hide, don’t you ever do
that to me again.”
To which Dr. Pitts replied,
“Ain’t no white man, gonna
shake his finger, in my Black
face, unless he knews I love
him.”
Concluding his remarks as he
began them. Dr. Calhoun said,
“Whatever you say of Lucius
Pitts and me, say this: “that we
are brothers. And if you have
to put a Black or white to it,
that’s your hang up and not
ours.”
The funeral, which was
scheduled to run about 45
minutes, lasted nearly two
hours. But it was marked by
laughter and not by tears. Only
twice did handerchiefs appear
in large numbers, once when
Dr. Pitts’ younger son, John
Eugene, spoke of his father and
read a poem his father recently
wrote to him entitled, “Be a
Man, John, A Mighty Man”.
Young Pitts then read a poem
he wrote to his father. He
spoke unemotionally.
Doris Terry of Miles College
almost shattered the
composure of the mourners
with her soulful rendition of “1
Believe”, which Dr. Pitts often
called on her to sing.
Otherwise, the funeral was
kept on a relatively light note.
Bishop C.J. Johnson, in
eulogizing Dr. Pitts, likened his
death with that of a young
man whose old car had broken
down a long way from home.
The young man telephoned his
father who told him don’t
worry about it. Junk the car.
You have my credit card. Go
to the nearest airport and come
on home.
Few people knew that Dr.
Pitts had a pacer in his chest to
keep.his heart beating properly,
that he was blind in one eye,
that he had diabetes, high
blood pressure and had
suffered two heart attacks. But
picking up on this point,
Bishop Johnson said that last
Monday night, Dr. Pitts’, old
body broke down. And God
told him, ‘Don’t worry about
it, junk that old body. You’ve
got my credit card. Go to the
nearest airport and come on
home’.”
“Well, what about my
college?”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll
take care of it. Just get on a
plane and come on home.”
Others appearing on the
program included Vernon
Jordan, director of the
National Urban League, Rev.
Gene R. Dean, Dr. Pitts’;
pastor; Michael Thurmond,
president of the Student
Government Association of
Paine College, Bishop P.
Randolph Shy, and the Rev.
Isaiah Scipio, Jr., general
secretary of the Board of
Missions of the CME Church.
(C 20 >)