REMEMBERING

Our beloved Principal, Mr. Graeme Armstrong Murray (August 24, 1931-April 7, 2015), on his 86^th birth anniversary.

   In MH (Mount Hermon School) we used to get a holiday on August 24^th because it was Mr. Murray’s birthday. On this day we recall the days of our youth in MH when Mr. Murray was there – 1955-1978.

   A former student, Ved Prakash Agarwal (SC 1971), paid a brief tribute to Mr. Murray in 1978, the year he left MH after serving for 24 years:

    “I did not know that this would be his last year, but somehow I was not surprised. I respected him as most children respected their teachers, and I suppose I was a bit infatuated with him. As a man I liked him and I hope I look at him honestly, good points, warts and all. I have never known him anything but honest, abrasive certainly, aggressive and blunt always, be it on the cricket field, in the classroom, or in the chapel where he is expounding a theory on the current trends of discipline among students.

    Mr. Murray is one of those most casual and immediately likable persons I have ever met. He knows character instinctively and is always in a hurry to impose the force of his own which is considerable. Perhaps the secret of his rugged good nature is that he is an incurable individualist, certain of himself that he can afford to be sure of others. This trait has always invited comments and he has been described by an NP (St. Joseph’s School) teacher as petulant, rude and stubborn. However, there is one yardstick about people I know. The ones who don’t change are the genuine ones. Bhuntay (a Nepali term for a fat person) has not bothered to change. He is always going to be his own man and do his own thing. He is loved by his students and although he endangers more arguments, more fury, more passing than others, he definitely is the most intriguing man I have ever met.

    Mr. Murray has been here for twenty-four years now. Thousands studied at his feet, united in reverence and love for him. I don’t know what he taught us and I don’t really care. He taught us to think and that was enough. That was the heart of it all, Bhuntay made us think. He was his own man. Non Scholae Sed Vitae Discimus (Not for school but for life we learn). That was his legacy to us – he made each of us what to be his own man.”

   In his final year at Mount Hermon, 1978, Mr. GA Murray in his Annual Principal’s Report on Speech Day, urged staff and students of the need to keep alive the spirit of Mount Hermon School.

   “Overall, I think, three things characterise what Mount Hermon is for me. I hope that they also speak to you of what is at the heart of our school, and that they will ever continue to do so. They are Friendship, Fellowship, and Worship. Perhaps I should have put Worship first, for it is in the worship and praise of God that we first find that friendship and fellowship which must characterise all we do in the Mount Hermon community.

   These are things I found at Mount Hermon when I came first with my wife, way back in 1955. These are things which I trust I have tried to cherish and develop through the years that have followed. These are now those values which I pass on to you, staff and students alike, for you to cherish and preserve and strengthen through the years that remain to you at Mount Hermon, that they may by you in your time  be transmitted to many others in the years to come.”

  On this special day we also remember – with love, thanks and gratitude – Mrs. Murray, Adrienne, Stephen, Bronwyn and Johnny for their service and friendship.

   “May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace.  (Numbers 6:24-26, Bible)

Hail Mt. Hermon!

CHARLES SWAN: A HERMON KNIGHT

Dr. Charles L. Swan and I share something in common. Both went to school, MH college (he, the Language School and me TTC) and later joined the staff. He joined our Queen's Hill School, then located above the Railway Station, Darjeeling, way back in 1914 in KG, and later taught in the present Mt. Hermon School - 1929-1936.

He is most remembered by us for his 'Going Home Day' songs. I met him in MH when I was teaching there in mid-'70S. I still remember how, one fine day in the staff room, he thundered: "You are APPOINTED to write!" What?

Was he a prophet? I have written three books already and am now preparing a souvenir on MH as a Tribute to these giants of MH - I refer to them as "HermonKnights".

When I edited the school's annual Hermonite magazine in 1978, this is was he said in the magazine:

"When I was a small boy in old Queen’s Hill, Miss Knowles, the founder of the school, was still Principal, and Miss Stahl was Vice-Principal. When I was appointed to teach at Mt. Hermon, Miss Stahl had only just retired from the principalship. So my memory leads me to think of the original purposes of the school. It was patterned after the Public Boarding Schools of England, but the pattern was given an American flare, and some major adjustments were made to fit to the Indian scene."

Dr. Swan died many years back. May he rest in peace. Hail Mt. Hermon!

IF PEACE DOES NOT PREVAIL

    If peace does not prevail because of our ego and stubbornness, because of our determination to defend our territory and sovereignty irrespective of consequences – we face the risk of war. Even small skirmishes may lead to a full-fledged war. This can and must be avoided at all cost.

   As the final hour toward that fate approaches the leadership of the world's two largest populated countries must re-think their decisions to go to war and avoid any move that would ultimately lead to a nuclear disaster on this planet.

    Sikkim – a sacred, hidden land, the last frontier of peace in the Himalaya – now faces the risk of being turned into a battlefield. If peace does not prevail in the Himalayan frontier it is not only because of those who are bent on destroying each other because of their hatred and greed and their lust for power, it is also because of our fate and destiny. The coming situation will remind us that “the peace of the grave or security of the slave” that we have witnessed in Sikkim in the past several decades will not last forever.

   On April 15, 1975, the Hindustan Times warned: “Security depends on people, not territory.” This applies to both India and China.

ON MY OWN

   In the remaining days of my life on earth and when I’m finally gone I would like to be remembered by these words of Theodore Roosevelt:  

                                       

   “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”