"With the middle of June came the usual commencement season,
and it was a glad time among our college people. True, many
appointments of a full-fledged college were lacking, but we had
much to be thankful for. There were nineteen competent and
loyal persons on the staff of administration and instruction.
A class of fifteen completed our course of study and received
our certificates of graduation from our junior college courses.
There were one Russian and one Albanian, besides Armenians and
Greeks. True, they were almost without exception refugees, but
they were picked fellows and were disciplined by their experience
of hard knocks. True, the resources of their school had been
meagre, but they had been used to the full. Members of the class
who went on to higher study elsewhere sooner or later did well,
practically without exception. One who went to Boston University
took his Bachelor of Arts degree with full credit in two years.
Several in the graduating class had worked their way almost
entirely and expected to fend for themselves without favor or
fear after their school days were done. As the College was a
growing concern, they expected to go on growing as its first
graduates in Macedonia.
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Mr. Getchell spent the early part of the summer in Constantinople,
where he had the use of his own old account books, later continued
by Theodore Riggs, including many deposits for safe keeping, and
all these accounts left during the dreadful days of deportation
were settled correctly. Mr. Compton, also, during the vacation
took a trip back to Merzifon, sorted the properties which had been
left behind and brought away some thirty-five boxes containing
movables, and including about one thousand library books, some
other equipment and apparatus, besides a good many personal
effects of individuals who had been located at the old home.
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During the early days of August, negotiations for the purchase
of the five fields aggregating eighteen acres, constituting our
main campus on the ridge back from the city and 500-600 feet
above the level of the Aegean Sea, were completed and during the
summer the deeds were deposited in our safe. The local habitation
of Anatolia College was determined. The first evidence of
occupation of this ground by our College was the construction
of a three-strand, barbed-wire fence around it with a clumsy
wooden gate, which bore the announcement that this was the
location of Anatolia College. Sunday, September 19th, we were
favored by a visit from Dr. and Mrs. Westervelt of Honolulu.
Together we visited our new campus purchase and paused at the
gate for a few moments, looking up over that rough and bare
ground and then Dr. Westervelt led us in prayer. This, I believe,
was the second such prayer ever offered in this place, on these
grounds."