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Summer 2003 | Volume 26, Number 3 | Campus | ||||
| Like Grandfather,
Like Grandson The Thrill of Graduation Transcends Age WHEN SHELDON ARNETT was born and raised on a remote Alberta farm in the early 1920s, his home had no electricity and no running water. The one-room schoolhouse he attended included nine grades. A rugged individualism would forever mark the young Canadian with a penchant for risk-taking and a fierce pride of accomplishment.
And in a poignant twist of providence, joining him at the platform before an assembly of nearly 6,000 was his grandson, Jeremiah (Jeremy) Johnson, who earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from SPU. Among the witnesses were 40 family members and friends who had traveled with Arnett from the Bend, Oregon, area where he now lives. Most of them had attended Seattle Pacific. “They are just amazed for me, after all this time,” says Arnett, who sat with the platform party and read Scripture from the Gospels of Matthew and Mark. The celebration carried over to a restaurant where the two guests of honor again shared the closeness that has marked their relationship all of Jeremy’s 22 years of life. Grandfather and grandson lived only 14 minutes apart and have ridden motorcycles, fished and bagged Alaskan caribou together. Just as visibly, they share a love for learning that transcends age. Though Arnett had tried before to take his final five-credit course long distance, it wasn’t until this year that Seattle Pacific’s class in medieval history became available by correspondence. “My teacher was Alberto Ferreiro, a great professor,” says Arnett. “He really analyzes your work and made lots of marks in the margins of my essays. He’s a Catholic, and I’m a Protestant. Those two perspectives made the class even more interesting.” Johnson, who is interning with a Payne Weber stock brokerage in Seattle this summer, thinks his grandfather, who trained fighter pilots and flew B-17s in World War II, is as “ornery and spunky” as he is accomplished. “He’s the biggest risk-taker I’ve ever seen,” says the new graduate. “Part of getting his degree now wasn’t even for himself. He’s always put a lot of pressure on his grandchildren to get a good education. I think earning his diploma was a way of giving that message a little more credence.”
— BY CLINT KELLY |
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 From the President Americans today are searching for a new tone for their lives. “We are talking here about another set of values — not the giddy sense of entitlement that emerges out of exuberant times,” says President Philip Eaton.
A Gift at Any Age The Retiring Class of 2003 Still Exploring
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