When Barack Obama is sworn in as the country’s 44th president on Tuesday, Jan. 20, a group of people with ties to Union will be on hand to witness history.
Students, a faculty member and a prominent alumnus are expected to be among a record crowd of as many as 3 million converging on the nation’s capital for the event.
The leaders of the Black Student Union have chartered a bus to take up to 55 students to Washington, D.C. The group doesn’t have tickets to the inaugural, so the odds are long they will get anywhere near the actual ceremony. Still, they wanted to be in proximity of the swearing-in of the nation’s first African American president.
“It’s a big deal for us,” said Nadia Alexis ’09, who along with Arkeisha Pace ’09, her co-chair of the Black Student Union, helped organize the eight-hour trip.
Alexis decided election night to plan the trip, which was open to all students and faculty. A line began forming hours before seats became available at 8:30 a.m. Monday, and slots were filled quickly. A waiting list of nearly 50 people was created. The group will leave just after midnight Monday, returning about 24 hours later.
“We have a chance to be a part of history,” she said. “It’s important for us to be there.”
Plans are also under way for students, faculty and staff who are unable to get to Washington to watch the ceremony at various spots on campus.
For Brad Hays, assistant professor of political science, scoring a coveted ticket to the inauguration was a simple matter of contacts. Prior to joining Union last fall, Hays taught for several years at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, befriending Dina Titus, a colleague in the political science department, and her husband, Tom Wright, a professor of history. When Titus, the former minority leader for the Nevada state senate, was elected to Congress on the same night as Obama’s historic win, Hays was able to secure a ticket.
“I don’t expect to get a chair,” said Hays, who can’t pick up his ticket until the day before Tuesday’s historic event. “I expect to be standing for a long time. But I’m just so excited to have the ‘golden ticket.’ ”
Hays will bunk with friends from his days as a graduate student at the University of Maryland. He expects the atmosphere in the D.C. area to be “slightly insane.”
“It’s a moment in history,” said Hays. “There was a part of me that didn’t want to deal with the mob scene. But when you think about the moment in time, and you have an appreciation for history and those great moments, you want to be there.”
Besides, Hays said, “I like a good party and this is going to be great party.”
Perhaps no one with a Union connection will have a better view of the inaugural than U.S. Rep. Neil Abercrombie '59 of Hawaii. Abercrombie, who earned a bachelor's degree in sociology from Union and was a member of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity and Student Council, was friendly with Obama’s mother and father while all three attended the University of Hawaii in the 1960s. He has known Obama since he was born.
“It is a stunning story that Hawaii would be the birthplace and the origin of the most powerful person on the planet, the President of the United States,” Abercrombie writes on his Web site. “Hawaii, its people, its diversity, and its spirit of aloha helped to shape President-elect Obama as a boy and young man growing up in these islands.
“When he ascends those stairs to the Inaugural platform at the U.S. Capitol, the people of Hawaii and his immediate ohana will follow his steps, as he assumes the reigns of an office for which he has worked so hard to attain and realizes a dream that he and Americans have only envisioned until this day.”