We have several scrapbooks in the Woodson that were kept by members of the first couple of graduating classes. If you study them closely you find that they are, among other things, testaments to the close relationships between the young people who were privileged to be the pioneers of student life at Rice. It was an exciting time to be here, as the architecture of the undergraduate experience was being imagined and then built. You see it too even in the local newspapers, where student parties and outings were given coverage: the excitement around the founding of the new institution carried over to the entire city.

Part of this is present in these scrapbooks in the form of bits and pieces of the rich and varied social life of the students. Among these scraps are dozens of Christmas cards exchanged between them. I’ve found the same simple card in many of the books, this from the very first brave soul to enroll at the Rice Institute and the first person to be awarded a Rice diploma, Ed Dupree ’16:

Here’s young Mr. Dupree, I’d guess sometime in the teens or early ’20s:

I join him in good wishes for the Yuletide.

Bonus: I also join another friend who says the best holiday greeting in this difficult year is “Let there be light.”