Class Day and Commencement exercises at Deep Valley High School are such momentous occasions that students prepare for them for weeks. Betsy and her friends all have important contributions to make: Tib will perform in a show, Tacy will sing a solo, and Betsy and Joe will deliver orations (Betsy’s on the heroines of Shakespeare, and Joe’s on the wheat mills of the midwest). Betsy even triumphs over Joe in the Essay Contest this year, which happens to make Joe exceedingly happy.

Commencement is so auspicious that Julia even returns from Germany, scattering gifts, cheer, and wisdom. Learning that Tony has gone to New York to start a new life, she tells Betsy, “You meant to be kind, but you weren’t being kind, really, when you deceived him all year” (p. 263, Harper Trophy paperback edition, 1995). The study of opera is going well, Julia reports, but she has so much to learn; her career is only at the very beginning.

It was not unusual for commencement ceremonies of the time high school or college, to include multiple student orations, for public speaking was seen as a critical life skill. Today, a commencement ceremony is more likely to feature an external speaker, but today, as then, it is a grand event, rich in significance.

Commencement Day proves to be both happy and sobering for the Crowd and their families. Tacy leaves the ceremony with Mr. Kerr, Tib goes with the football hero Ralph Maddox, and Betsy and Joe stroll slowly home “through a warm night full of fireflies, smelling of the honeysuckle in bloom over Deep Valley porches” (p. 175, Harper Trophy paperback edition, 1996). They plan an important outing for the next day. Joe Willard would finally climb the Big Hill with Betsy…physically and metaphorically.

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On the role of orations in commencements, see: https://historicallyspeaking.blog/2024/05/01/evolving-graduation-ceremonies-and-historic-commencement-speeches/#:~:text=Other%20traditions%20are%20much%20newer,chosen%20to%20address%20the%20crowds.