What was the climate like at the in the late 1960s?
LOUIS SMITH: I draw on Charles Dickens in A Tale of Two Cities to describe what Puget Sound was like as an 18-year-old African American student arriving on Puget Sound campus in the fall of 1964: “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness… it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.” The things that were happening at the time were monumental in our Black community, but less so, if at all, in the broader white community: The Birmingham bus boycott in 1955–56. The 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing in 1963. The murder of civil rights activists James Chaney, Michael Schwerner, and Andrew Goodman in 1964, the same year I came to Puget Sound. The assassination of Malcolm X in 1965. And three years later, the assassination of Dr. King. There was also a disconnect between some white faculty and what was happening in Black America, too. In one class in the fall of 1964, the professor equated the raising of a Black fist that had been shared from a magazine article on the growth of Black Power movement on college campuses with the Nazi salute of World War II. This was the reality facing Black students who came to campus over the next four to five years [as part of focused athletic recruitment efforts that started in the mid-1960s.] After creating the BSU, we had a place to gather to support each other in our pain, to share our tears of disappointment. Creating a BSU meant that when we left, all students coming to Puget Sound would have a place to grow and nurture their own professional development and being.
How did the BSU come to life?
LOUIS SMITH: At the time, I had some very close friends at the University of Oregon, and one weekend I went to visit the campus, which was much bigger and had a larger, diverse community of students. They had a BSU meeting while I was there, and I was welcomed to attend. The experience was fantastic. The love, support, and camaraderie there struck a nerve with me. I needed to take this back to Puget Sound to see if I could plant that seed and germinate and nurture it, so it could grow into something that would be as beneficial to our campus as it was at the University of Oregon.
BILL BAARSMA: I was really influenced by my first spouse, Natalie Jane Myers, who was a close friend of Martin Luther King Jr. She talked about working in the trenches, being beaten up, and being jailed during that period. It certainly left an impression on me. [After completing my graduate studies], I returned to teach at Puget Sound in 1968. Booth Gardner, the director of the school of business and economics who later became governor of the state of Washington, came into my office and said: “Your wife, Natalie, was a good friend of Martin Luther King Jr. and worked with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference?” I said yes. And then he said: “You believe in social justice and civil rights, and you’re committed to the cause?” and I said yes. He said: “I would like to have you serve as the acting coordinator of the Black Studies Program. But to do that, you have to get the buy-in of the BSU leaders, because you’ll be working closely with them.” I can still remember going to the student center to meet with Lou and George Neely ’70, Al Roberts ’69, and Jerome Crawford ’69. I tried cracking a joke to establish a rapport, but they were quite serious, and so I said: “Look. If you hang with me during this semester, you will have the opportunity to be part of the hiring of the full-time coordinator of the Black Studies Program at the university, and you will actually approve the hiring. I’ll make that commitment.” And we agreed to that, and Floyd Davis was hired.
What were you expecting of the BSU in the late 1960s?
LOUIS SMITH: One of things that I wanted was to have the opportunity for students to come and participate in all of the experiences that the university had to offer. However, we saw beyond that vision the need to add to what the university was offering. We had silly ideas about Black history and literature; we had no idea how broad a scope that would require. But we had that seed, and we first had to educate ourselves: what was our history? And it was amazing what we did not know. For instance: Lerone Bennett Jr.’s book, Before the Mayflower. That was the first Black history book that most of us had ever read. When I got to Puget Sound, I learned about it because we as a BSU dove into it. We were hungry for it. We wanted to learn about ourselves, our diverse culture, and we wanted that diverse culture to be taught at the university level.
What did support look like for the BSU at a more institutional level?
BILL BAARSMA: The administration was very leery of the BSU, and student activism in general. And I can remember one incident — I had met with the leaders of the BSU; we had a room up in the tower of Jones Hall. We were discussing an incident involving an older student and her husband, who was wearing a dashiki and had an afro, who was with her over at the student center. They wanted to have lunch and [the staff] wouldn’t serve her husband. We were talking about this incident up in the tower and afterwards, as I walked down the steps, I ran into an administrator. And I’ll never forget what he said: “Well, I understand that the Black students have real concern about [this incident].” I said “Yeah,” and then I thought to myself: “How the hell did he know that we’ve been talking about that?” From that point on, all the meetings up in that room were scripted, and the real discussions were off campus. There was a lot of suspicion and concern and sensitivity about the “radical” members of the BSU.
What was the outcome that you wanted to see of the BSU at the time?
LOUIS SMITH: We wanted to create the environment for the success of the students that are there. That means to support their academic success, but it also means to support socialization. One of the things that I’m proudest of at Puget Sound was that we threw parties where we danced, listened to music, and had a good time. We also had picnics and played softball in the spring and fall. It was not all about academic success, it was also “what is college supposed to be?” Challenges, of course. Growth, of course. But it’s also supposed to be a fun time when you love on and celebrate your culture. Remember again the despair that I shared with you from the opening of A Tale of Two Cities? I wanted to be sure as a founding member and president that no other student of color that came to Puget Sound would have that view of despair in remembering their college experience.
What are the words of encouragement you’d provide to young leaders who are trying to take these steps towards their own reformative justice and community building today?
LOUIS SMITH: The challenges that we still have before us as a people and as a nation are substantial. Do we continue to have our democracy as we change from being a white majority culture to a majority culture of people of color? Do we continue to live out the dream of democracy? Do we continue the work that we as a nation dedicated ourselves to starting in 1787, that we the people of the United States in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and security the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity?
That is the challenge that Bill and I pass along to you. We didn’t know how we were going to do it, and the furthest thing from my mind was that 50 years later, the Black Student Union would be as vibrant and as important on the Puget Sound campus as it obviously is today. But we can celebrate every component of university life that exists today to support the well-being and success of students and faculty of color — every administrator of color on campus today who wasn't even a dream in 1968, every faculty member of color on campus today who was a distant dream in 1968, and every trustee representing diversity today who was missing throughout the earlier decades. Undoubtedly, we have more work to do. However, there is much that has been accomplished that we can be proud of over these 57 years.
Looking ahead, I encourage our community to collaborate. Yes, Puget Sound is a small, liberal arts campus, but it’s in a metropolitan region with four college presidents who are African American. Each of these schools has a Black student contingent we want to see supported, and each has alumni who we want to build successful careers, lives, and strong families. There is a lot we can accomplish by working together in Tacoma.
I have every confidence that today’s students will step up to this challenge. We weren’t trying to make history! Furthest thing from our mind! We were trying to do what needed to be done. I challenge all Puget Sound students today to carry the torch that we’ve passed on to you. Carry it high, and as you leave the university, make sure that you pass that torch on to students who are as dedicated as you are, to make sure that the flames continue and are not extinguished. Make sure you brighten a way for other students to follow you.
Janae Hill ’26 is majoring in English and minoring in communication studies at Puget Sound. After graduation, she plans on finishing her fantasy novel.
