Reprinted with permission of the News-Register. By Starla Pointer, March 11, 2019.
Friday’s inauguration of Linfield College’s new president wasn’t just about Miles Davis, who has been on the job since last July. It also was about every segment of the Linfield community.
Group by group — students, professors and other employees, graduates and others — stood to pledge their support for Davis and for the college itself.
“President Davis, these are your students. Provide them with an education for a lifetime, as well as for a livelihood,” said David Baca, chairman of the board of trustees, as Wildcats stood.
As faculty and staff members rose, he continued, “These are your colleagues who deliver and support education. Collaborate and consult with them.”
Baca, a 1978 graduate, introduced his fellow alumni as “the continuity of the college across generations.” He asked the president to “protect the value of their degrees; count on them for advice, support and financial assistance.”
All these people, along with McMinnville community members and colleagues from other schools “care about you and about Linfield,” Baca said. “Each of us has a unique relationship to this wonderful college.”
And with that, at 4:30 p.m on what McMinnville Mayor Scott Hill declared “Miles K. Davis Day,” the college formally recognized the new president. Cheers went up. The crowd in Ted Wilson Gymnasium stood and applauded. And Tracy Fitzsimmons, who called herself “the one loser” among the hundreds of people celebrating, congratulated Linfield for its “extraordinary gain” in hiring Davis.
Fitzsimmons is president of Shenandoah University, the Virginia liberal arts institution where Davis had worked since 2001 before coming to Linfield. During his tenure as dean of Shenandoah’s business school, he grew enrollment by 77 percent, doubled its number of faculty members and “dramatically increased” its diversity, she said. And he always looked at the big picture, she said. No wonder she hated to see him leave, she said, especially since it meant Shenandoah also was losing another great professor, Naomi Pitcock, Davis’ wife.
But she wasn’t at all surprised; In 2011, she’d told him she pictured him as a college president. And she had fielded call after call from other colleges eager to hire him. In late 2017, Davis became a finalist in Linfield’s search for a replacement for President Thomas Hellie, who was retiring after a dozen years with the college. He called Fitzsimmons from McMinnville and told her he liked the Oregon school. “Linfield feels like a special place,” she recalled Davis saying.
Visiting campus herself for the inauguration, Fitzsimmons agreed. “I can tell. There is magic here,” she said.
Keynote speaker Phylicia Rashad, known for acting on Broadway and on television’s “The Cosby Show” and “Empire,” agreed with the Shendoah president: Oregon is a state of unparalleled beauty, she said, and Linfield is fortunate — and wise — to have hired Davis.
“I congratulate him and commend you for your choice of leadership,” she said.
Rashad is a magna cum laude graduate of Howard University and the first Denzel Washington Chair in Theater at Fordham University. In addition to performing on TV and stage, she has made her mark in entertainment and directing. She has won a Tony Award and been honored by the NAACP and other groups.
On Friday, though, she talked not of herself, but of Davis and his accomplishments. Rashad met Linfield’s new president several years ago through her brother-in-law, former NBA star Norman Nixon, who attended Duquesne University in Pittsburgh along with Davis. Nixon has spoken about the business of sports at Davis’ Shenandoah business school; he suggested Rashad speak about the business of entertainment.
“When he said ‘Miles Davis,’ I smiled,” Rashad said, recalling how she thought she would be meeting a famous musician. “I arrived and met Miles … he’s jazzy, for sure, but not that jazz artist.”
She was taken with his dedication to principles as an educator and an administrator with a business background. She was taken by his integrity, his respect for others and his immense knowledge. And she was taken by his willingness “to move beyond his comfort zone in constant pursuit of excellence.”
The latter is a quality “all great artists possess,” she said.
Rashad said her friend Davis is driven to “make the world a better place by educating another generation.”
“This is huge,” she said. It’s uncommon, she added. “This is a matter of grace.”
Davis listened to Rashad and all the other speeches with humility and pleasure, often grinning or clapping.
He is known for his positive attitude, speakers said. They noted he often says he is “too blessed to be stressed” or that “even my bad days are good days.”
When it was his turn to address the crowd, he offered a shorter sentiment: “Wow!” Then he thanked “all these people for saying great things in front of my mother and father.” He thanked numerous individuals, as well, and groups of his supporters, including Linfield’s board of trustees, its faculty and staff, and its students.
“You’re the reason I’m here,” he told the latter.
Davis described how the world has changed since Linfield was founded by the American Baptist Convention 161 years ago. In 1858, he said, how could they have imagined the college would have two campuses, 159 faculty members and 32 percent of its enrollment made up of students of color? How could they have imagined having an African-American president?
He quoted a segment of President Abraham Lincoln’s message to Congress in December 1862 — a 39-word statement included in Aaron Copland’s “Portrait of Abraham Lincoln” that he described as being “like a lullaby.”
“The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise — with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew.”
Linfield is anew, and the world is anew, Davis said.
“We cannot ignore difficult challenges on a global scale that require local action,” he said. “The world is in need of leaders who will rise above populism and engage in shared humanity.”
Linfield must prepare its students to tackle those challenges and be those leaders, he said. “The world needs the kind of people educated at Linfield College.”
The two-hour inauguration ceremony began with Davis, Linfield faculty and visitors entering as the college marching band played “When the Saints Go Marching In.”
Everyone was dressed in academic regalia — gowns in a rainbow of colors representing their schools and the places where they’d earned their degrees. Davis himself wore an elaborate robe in purple and cardinal, Linfield’s colors. He was joined by four of Linfield’s five most recent former presidents: Hellie, 2006-18; Marv Henberg, interim from 2005-06; Charles Walker, 1975-1992; and Gordon Bjork, 1968-1974. Vivian Bull, president from 1992 to 2005, planned to attend, but was called away at the last minute.
During the ceremony, the Linfield College Choir performed a South American greeting song, “Hlohonolofatsa,” or “Bless Everything.” Linfield singers paired up with Portland’s Vancouver Avenue First Baptist Church Choir for “Blessings of Abraham,” an uptempo hymn that had Davis dancing and beckoning the crowd to clap.
The president was on his feet again for another song, “Order My Steps,” performed by the Vancouver Avenue church choir. The Rev. J.W. Matt Hennessee from Vancouver Avenue joined four other faith leaders in speaking. Linfield’s Chaplain David Massey started the invocation, followed by the college’s Rabbi Gary Ellison and Wajdi Said, president and co-founder of the Muslim Educational Trust.
And Erika Marksbury, pastor of McMinnville’s First Baptist Church, gave the benediction. Following that, Davis, his predecessors, visitors and faculty marched out of the gym to another familiar tune: the theme from “Shaft.”
