Concluding Thoughts

Samford friends,

I suppose it is permissible for me to admit, now that I am so near the finish line, that I didn’t necessarily arrive at Samford in 2006 with the intention of falling in love with the institution. I was called here to do a job, a significant job, and I pledged to serve as faithfully as I could for as long as I was needed, and until an appropriate time for retirement. But I was an Arkansan, loyal to a sense of place, and my own alma mater and cherished friends were hundreds of miles away.

My wife, Jeanna, my daughter, Riley, and I had no idea how completely and utterly we would fall in love with Samford University, now the great passion of our lives.

On an afternoon in the latter part of our first summer at Samford, we welcomed the assembly of new freshmen and their families in the Wright Center. Jeanna and I sat together at the conclusion of the program, watching as scenes flashed on the screen depicting Samford people and places from the founding to the present. And suddenly, there we were on the screen. My family. And in that moment, I knew that we were linked with thousands of people, past

and present, who cherished Samford as a unique, wonderful, life-changing institution. I shook my head in wonder and gratitude, thankful to be within that association. I fell in love with Samford that afternoon, with all of its challenges and opportunities, flaws and potential. Fifteen years and thousands of decisions later, that love has only grown.

Serving as Samford’s president has been the greatest honor of my professional life. It is the greatest honor because of the people I have encountered here and my abundant gratitude for all that they have done.

Across almost 180 years, 18 individuals have assumed the responsibilities of this office, and in March, Samford announced that Dr. Beck A. Taylor will become the nineteenth. The members of the search committee have made a wise and inspired decision, and Dr. Taylor will have my quiet loyalty and steadfast, enduring support. A new link will be forged and added to a very long chain. I am filled with hope for the opportunities that lie ahead for our new administration.

A two-volume history of Samford, written by James F. Sulzby Jr. and published in 1986, is a required piece of literature for those of us who are often seeking to trace some significant element of Samford’s past as we are writing reports or establishing facts. Dozens of times my co-workers have heard me mutter, “where did I last put the Sulzby books?” Weeks ago, once again in search of historical facts, my eyes fell upon this line from the second Sulzby volume, page 1159, a sentence written by that Samford stalwart, Bill Nunnelley: “Corts is fond of saying that the finest tribute we can pay the past is to make the future even better. He quotes Robert Browning to say, ‘The best is yet to be.’”

The poem, of course, is “Rabbi ben Ezra,” with lines that lend themselves so easily to borrowing when writing speeches or love letters. That Dr. Corts spoke of the Browning poem years ago did not surprise me; what surprised me was that my own mind has turned to the poem so many times as I contemplate retirement from the Samford presidency—and how many times I have quoted it in recent months. Within the space of a few words, the poem offers both inspiring hope and blessed assurance. “The best is yet to be,” yes. Then, two lines down, “Our times are in his hand.”

Those two thoughts combine as we approach a transition from one administration to another. Samford’s best days lie ahead. All of it, all of it, is in God’s hands.

Thank you, Samford friends, on behalf of my family, for blessings beyond anything we could have imagined.

As always, please keep Samford in your prayers.

Andrew Westmoreland

800 Lakeshore Drive Birmingham, AL 35229

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