Volume 2, Issue 666 • October 2019
WELCOME TO THE HALLOWEEN EDITION OF REVEILLE We wish you… Oh! Sorry, wrong holiday. What do you get when you take the inside out of a hot dog? A hollow weenie. In this edition, we’re mixing in some MMA tales, some from personal experience and just some fun facts and truths and non-truths about Halloween. I was in Headquarters during my first year at MMA in the 1975-76 school year. For those of who don’t know what Headquarters is, it was the top floor of the Administration Building (now called Stribling Hall). It was the rooms for cadets in grades 4-6 and a few 7th graders. Right above the water fountain in Headquarters was an access panel to the dome. At that time, it was silver, not gold like it is now. Old boys told recruits that through the panel and up in the dome was where they put Colonels when they died. As a young, impressionable cadet, one has the tendency to believe stuff like that. During the night, after taps, when we woke up to go to the head and use the water fountain, we kept an eye on the access panel just in case. During Mother’s Day Weekend (now known as Spring Family Weekend), the first time that my parents came to see me, I mentioned it to my mother. She didn’t know what to say because she didn’t have much of a sense of humor. When my dad came later in the year, I showed him the access panel that I had been telling him stories about. He laughed when seeing it and that made my day and year. Fast forward a few years later after I graduated. I stopped by MMA to say hello to Col. Kelly during his last year as Academy president. I walked up the steps of Stribling Hall and ran into a Marine General and thought to myself that there aren’t many of them. Col. Kelly walked around the corner and said “hello” with his ever-present smile. We chatted for a few minutes bringing each other up to date on what was happening in each other’s lives. We walked the halls of just about every building and I heard behind-thescenes stories that I never knew about as a cadet. I showed him my first room and told him stories that he had never heard before. Since they were nearly ready to take down the old Stribling Hall, I told him the story about putting the dead Colonels in the dome and about the access panel. He replied that he sure hoped that they didn’t do that because he was an old Colonel now. We got a good laugh out of it. The truth is that none of the old Colonels were put up there. Sincerely, Richard Cooper ’82
Volume 2, Issue 666 • October 2019
A cadet with his spooky Halloween decoration in 1980.