Celebration and salute: River Campus marks 10th year with concert, a thank-you to predecessor college

St. Vincent’s College alumni from around the country joined Southeast Missouri State University faculty for a ceremony and performance honoring the Vincentians’ legacy Tuesday, during which officials from the university and city of Cape Girardeau formally thanked the religious order.

The ceremony took place in the Shuck Recital Hall — which served as the Vincentians’ chapel before being remodeled — as part of a celebration of the 10th anniversary of Southeast’s River Campus. To cap the celebration, a concert including a symphonic piece specially written to honor the Vincentians was also performed Tuesday night in Bedell Performance Hall.

The grounds where the River Campus stands once were St. Vincent’s College. The Vincentians’ seminary was one of the first institutions of higher learning west of the Mississippi River.

Rhonda Weller-Stilson, director and associate dean of the Holland School of the Visual and Performing Arts, said during the ceremony the fact the site now hosts a campus dedicated solely to the arts is remarkable.

“It has surpassed our wildest dreams,” she said.

Gordon "Dick" Goodwin discusses his commissioned composition, "Timeless Banks and Shoals," as lyricist Paddy Bell, center, and conductor Sara Edgerton listen before its world-premiere performance by the Southeast Missouri Symphony Orchestra during "A Tribute to the River Campus: Past, Present and Future" on Tuesday in Bedell Performance Hall.Fred Lynch

St. Vincent’s alumnus the Rev. Ronald W. Ramson, C.M., of St. Mary’s of the Barrens in Perryville, Missouri, used a popular moniker for St. Vincent’s alumni when introducing himself.

“I’m a Cape boy,” he said.

Ramson came to Cape Girardeau from Chicago, he said, but soon found himself at home at the seminary.

“Some of the best teachers I ever had were right here in Cape Girardeau with Vincentian priests,” he said.

They were strict in their discipline and intellectual endeavors.

He said when he complained to an instructor his Latin studies had become unbearable, the teacher told him, “The train leaves Cape every day at noon, honey.”

Past theology, he said he learned community living at the seminary. He said one of the most important lessons he learned was how to benefit from “the treasury of extraordinary talents” and accommodate the “vast idiosyncrasies” of his fellow Vincentians.

Southeast president Carlos Vargas-Aburto said when he first arrived in Cape Girardeau, several people told him the same thing.

“Wait until you see the River Campus,” he said. “They were not wrong.”

He cited the pedagogical traditions established by the Vincentians as one of the cornerstones upon which Southeast now rests.

He and Cape Girardeau Mayor Harry Rediger presented representatives of the Vincentians with official resolutions recognizing their contributions to the community.

Gordon “Dick” Goodwin, professor emeritus at University of South Carolina, then spoke about the music he composed specifically to honor the Vincentians’ history.

The four-movement work, which closed the concert performed Tuesday night, “A Tribute to the River Campus,” is titled “Timeless Banks and Shoals.”

The first movement pulled from the natural themes that would have defined the area before European settlers arrived.

One section mimicked the calls of birds that live along the Mississippi River.

The second movement celebrated the settlers’ arrival and the change embodied by the river.

The third, Goodwin said, focuses on the Vincentians, who established their seminary in Cape Girardeau in 1838.

The last movement pays homage to the artists who now walk the grounds and to the future of the River Campus.

The choral lyrics, written by Paddy Bell, bring the piece to a close with a sense of anticipation.

“This is our music, our timeless music shall rise,” the lyrics say. “Rise. Rise.”

tgraef@semissourian.com

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