Five years after Stephen F. Austin State University first opened its doors as a teachers college, a group of former students met, at the request of President Birdwell, to lay plans for the organization of an Ex-Students Association.

Attending the meeting in the Social Room of the Austin Building that November 29, 1928, were twenty former students, some of whom either were or would soon become employees of the college. They established an interim organization and began planning for the first homecoming celebration two years later. They also elected as interim officers J. V. Dean, a 1925 graduate who had returned in 1927 as an SFA employee, president; Mrs. Gladys Johnson, wife of an SFA faculty member and later a faculty member herself, vice-president; Frances Wilson, secretary-treasurer; Herman Alders, corresponding secretary; and Mrs. Raymond Rockefort, reporter.

The first homecoming celebration took place May 27, 1930, concurrently with SFA’s commencement exercises. A substantial number of former students and others attended both the commencement exercises and a homecoming luncheon that followed at the Liberty Hotel (now the Gladys Hampton building, seat of Nacogdoches city government).

As he would do for each homecoming celebration in the 1930s, SFA President A. W. Birdwell addressed those in attendance at the first gathering. Although his remarks at the 1930 celebration were not fully reported, they advanced the themes of (1) the importance of the former students maintaining contact with their alma mater through the Association; (2) the usefulness of establishing contacts with state and national organizations, such as the Texas Federated Ex-Students Association, to promote higher education in Texas and nationally; (3) the need for former students to assist SFA in lobbying the Texas legislature for adequate financial support; and (4) the importance of raising private money for scholarships.

In other words, President Birdwell stressed the reciprocal relationship of the college and its former students: the college had helped prepare its students for life and, in turn, the students should continue to support the college through financial gifts and service.

Following President Birdwell's example, his successors have dealt in their way with those themes and that relationship: Presidents Paul T. Boynton, Joe N. Gerber (interim), Ralph W. Steen, William R. Johnson, Donald E. Bowen, William J. Brophy (interim), and Dan Angel.

While homecoming in the spring had already become a tradition at SFA, the first great Homecoming was in the May of 1930 with one thousand people attending. During this first official Homecoming, former students elected as president Herman Alders and chose as secretary-treasurer Frances Wilson. M. Jessie Hickman, as SFA faculty member, was appointed by President Birdwell as the first executive secretary, a position she held in addition to teaching. In 1931 and 1932, the spring events grew much larger. The Ex-Students Association decided in the summer of 1935 to have a Homecoming celebration in the fall as well. They set their celebration date, designated as the “first annual,” to coincide with the Lumberjack game with the Huntsville Bearkats. Charles Gribble, the president in 1935, said the move was being made to allow more people to participate; Birdwell and other college authorities offered their cooperation and support. Dixon Abney was elected vice-president, and Madge Edmond Stallings was elected Secretary.

Homecoming, as people know it today, started surrounding the Bearkat game on November 23, 1935. Hundreds of special invitations were sent out, along with announcements to area newspapers, stickers, and posters to ex-students all over East Texas. Pep rallies, bonfires, receptions, dances, coronations of favorites, parades, and all of the other things we associate with Homecoming were part of the 1935 campus-wide celebrations. The Spring Homecomings, which continued to be sponsored by the Ex-Students Association, became more and more of a Nacogdoches event and less an SFA event. SFA was growing and changing. Just as the fledgling college it served, the SFA Ex-Students Association had not only survived the great economic depression, but it had expanded its reach and redefined it emphasis. There were only ninety-two paid members aet at $1.50 a year! Before the Association could really address this problem systemmatically, World War II erupted to pose an even greater threat than had the Depression to the Association, the college, and the nation . The miracle is that both SFA and its Ex-Students Association survived. But both did, and the Association continued to meet annually and to be otherwise active even though the scope of its activity was limited.

At the close of the war, Dr. Birdwell’s presidential successor Dr. Paul L. Boynton--who had managed to keep the college functioning in adversity--moved to strengthen the Ex-Students Association. In April of 1946, he employed Joe D. Lacy, who held both a B. S. and an M. A. degree from SFA, as the first full-time executive secretary. A native of Carthage, Lacy had held public school administrative positions in East Texas. One of his first projects was to visit former SFA students teaching in the East Texas public schools and others engaged in business in counties in the SFA service area. He encouraged a revival of the organization of county ex-student organizations to complement the parent organization on campus; started earlier, these had become dormant during the war.

Lacy, however, had barely settled into his work, when the business manager's position became vacant at SFA. President Boynton appointed him to that position.

Lawrence T. Franks, a former SFA "Lumberjack" basketball star who was teaching at the time in Pineland public schools, succeeded Lacy as the second full-time executive secretary of the Ex-Students Association. He served from 1946-64, when he became Dean of Men at the University of Texas at Austin. For two of those years, 1951-53, while Franks pursued doctoral study elsewhere, his assistant Edwin W. Gaston, Jr., served as interim executive secretary.

During the Franks years, the Association succeeded in organizing county chapters in Dallas, Harris, Polk, Rusk, Shelby, and elsewhere. At that time, projects undertaken by the Association before the war, were revived and enhanced.

One of those major projects was the scholarship fund honoring President Birdwell which originated at the 1942 homecoming celebration but had grown at an understandably slow pace during the war. By 1953, the fund had grown from a few hundred dollars to more than $10,000. Today it is vastly more than that.

Following Dr. Franks' resignation in 1964, Jerry Johnson--a former student and then an SFA staff officer--became interim executive secretary of the Association. He was succeeded in 1965 by John L. Bailey, an insurance agency executive and former SFA football star. Bailey served from 1965-71.

In 1971-72, C. R. Voigtel--a former student and then an SEA staff officer--acted as executive secretary. Like Jerry Johnson before him, Voigtel performed the Association’s work in addition to his regular staff duties.

Voigtel's successor, Bob Sitton--also a former student and public school coach and teacher--became the longest serving chief operating officer of the Association to date. In 1998, when he took a modified assignment to concentrate on fund raising and public relations, Sitton had served twenty-six years.

During the Sitton years, the Ex-Students Association increased in membership from hundreds to thousands, its scholarship funds grew from a few thousand dollars to millions of dollars, and its offices on campus underwent several expansions (the most recent to be completed in October of 1998).

Also during the Sitton years, the organization changed its name from Ex-Students to Alumni Association, updated its constitution, created a Foundation to administer the scholarship programs, created an alumni magazine (formerly in the early years of the Association copies of the SFA student newspaper The Pine Log were mailed to members), and performed countless other services.

Succeeding Sitton in 1998 as the CEO of the Alumni Association, Dr. Miles McCall--a former SFA student and later a faculty member--took the job of alumni leader under a new title of Vice President for Alumni Affairs.

The alumni CEOs have been notably assisted by women assistants, most of whom held other full-time Positions at SFA. Sugene Spears, President A. W. Birdwell's secretary and then President Paul L. Boynton's secretary, was one of the earliest. Then, Madge E. Stallings, director of the SFA printing operation, worked even beyond her retirement until her death with alumni. projects. Today, as she has for much of Bob Sitton's tenure, Betty Ford directs the complex office work.

In 1998, as Stephen F. Austin State University celebrates its Seventy-Fifth birthday of its opening, its slightly younger offspring the Alumni Association takes stock of its 70 years of existence. The Association notes that its membership, originally mostly men and women associated with public school teaching and administration, now includes persons from virtually every business and profession.

The Alumni Association's presidents have been drawn from those businesses and professions. Most have been men, but four have been notable women: Gladys Johnson, a former student, faculty wife, and later a faculty member; Mary Osborne Ray, daughter of an SFA professor and wife of an attorney who helped guide the governmental reorganization of the Association into its present form; and Peggy Wedgeworth Wright and Susan S. Roberds, both of whom have served the University as Regents.

More than 25 men who were former students and Alumni Presidents have also served as University Regents. The first of these, S. A. Kerr, served on the Texas State Teachers College board. All others have served on the SFASU board created in 1969.

In sum, the University and its alumni organizations have met and indeed surpassed President A. W. Birdwell's vision of a reciprocal relationship for the common good.