My first week of my freshman year was in August 1978.
Yes, SMU had indoor plumbing back then. The dorms were actually nicer than the football stadium. The legal drinking age was 18.
Eat your hearts out.
Being from a very small town and having arrived on campus with stars in my eyes—there were more good looking girls on campus than there were people living in my hometown—I was somewhat awed by it all.
I had never seen or heard of a BMW before. Or topsiders. If it hadn’t been for Culwell and Son across the street, I would have continued to traipse around campus in a pair of overalls, Converse All Stars and concert t-shirts (my Kiss t-shirt would be worth a fortune now).
On the third day of school, my uncle invited me to breakfast at the famed Lucas B&B café on Oak Lawn. The sign is still there but it has since become a Pappadeaux restaurant.
What he told me over pancakes and eggs carried me further than what I learned in the four years of classes that I would take (Charlie Helfert’s were the best ones, though).
He told me that while I lacked confidence, I should know that SMU didn’t accept “slugs.”
The best and brightest and the most creative young people in the U.S. were walking around right there on the SMU campus and that I should count myself among them. And that was a good start for me.
Today that still holds true. And truth be known, I couldn’t get in to SMU, today, with the grades and test scores I had back then, a tribute to the competitiveness that exists in these times and the fact that SMU has gotten better as times have moved on.
The most important thing I took from our breakfast was people.
“Half of those students are going to bury themselves in their studies and miss the real essence of that school,” he said. “The wealth in that education is in the people you will meet. Many of them will become friends for life. Many of them will become successful in business and other endeavors and many of them will be running Dallas 20 years from now.”
He was dead on. One of those “people” was my floor mate on Cockrell, who became a close friend and fraternity brother.
He and his wife, the Armstrongs, recently funded SMU with a new upper class dorm. I asked him, since we were friends and all, if I could maybe spend a night in that dorm when it opened. He said, “No.”
I urge you SMU students to “get involved.” One doesn’t have to join a fraternity or sorority to “get involved” but don’t poo-pooh it.
Of the 39 guys I pledged with, 20 of us are still close in contact to this day, vacation together, have been in each other’s weddings, do business together.
But there are ton of other non-Greek ways to “get involved”
on campus.
And “getting involved” really means one thing: you meet people. You are in the epicenter of this country right now, economically and socially, just as we were in 1978-82
(“Dallas” was the number one TV show at that time).
With the George W. Bush Library being built, you are going to be an arms’ length away from some of the most famous and influential people of our time. Go work at the Library.
The oil, gas, and real estate businesses are going to flourish, right there 5 minutes away from you. Go take an internship at one of those firms. Rick Perry will probably run for President and win. Be a part of that by working in his campaign. The people you will meet while at SMU will be more valuable than the degree you get.
Participate in intramurals, although you may not be any good. Get in Charlie Helfert’s classes and learn about life and have a lot of fun. “It is people,” my Uncle said,
in 1978, and it is still “people” at SMU, more than ever. Pony Up!
Rick Larson is a 1982 graduate of SMU and member of Phi Gamma Delta fraternity, and has been a stockbroker/investment banker for 26 years. He can be reached for comment at [email protected]
