On
May 15, 2001, graduating students attending GS Class Day — held
the evening before the Columbia University Commencement — were treated
to a talk from a world-famous alumnus, R. W. “Johnnie” Apple.
Readers
of The New York Times have been accustomed to seeing Mr. Apple’s
byline during recent decades. Today, he is the newspaper’s chief
correspondent.
Here,
paraphrased, is how Mr. Apple’s lecture firm, Harry Walker Agency,
sums up a career of accomplishments that would take too much space
to write about in this issue of The Owl:
For
30 years, R. W. Apple, Jr. has roamed the United States and the
world, traveling close to a quarter of a million miles a year as
an eyewitness to history during the most eventful periods in the
modern era. He has known and interviewed every president since Lyndon
B. Johnson, plus senators, governors, and world leaders on five
continents. Few journalists of our time have seen as many great
events; for that reason, he is a sought-after commentator on television
in the United States and abroad. He participates regularly in major
international forums discussing diplomatic, economic, and military
questions.
To
quote Mr. Apple, “I love GS.” He graduated magna cum laude in 1961,
and won the John A. Krout Award for excellence in history. In 1986,
his alma mater presented him with the Owl Award, an honor bestowed
each year on a distinguished alumnus/na.
It
was great to have Mr. Apple return to GS as the featured speaker
at Class Day!
