Hal-Le-Lu-YAH: February 2016

Sorry I’m late getting this out to you.

Transferring my thoughts and memories from the experience of a lifetime twenty-five years ago into words on paper turned out not to be as easy as I thought it may be when you first introduced me to the idea of writing about my active years Spring of 90 to Spring of 94.

The four years I lived in the AGR House whether I knew it at the time or not was beyond a doubt the experience of a lifetime. I will try to keep this as clean as I can.

Last Flag Football Game for several of us pictured here in the Fall of 93. AGR's Defeated Sigma Chi's in Final Game of the Season in last two minutes AGR Touchdown Drive Touchdown Pass From Robinson to G. Davis. Great Victory to Finish Our Four Years of Competitive AGR Flag Football.

I always loved getting to know and recruiting New Initiates. Inviting those who showed potential to run, workout, go hit some golf balls at the range, play volleyball, basketball, shoot guns or drink some beer on a road trip or out at the locks.

Get to know them before they may or may not receive an invitation to pledge.

Recruit Quality more than Quantity to Preserve your House with Brothers who would continue to set the bar high long after you were gone was always a personal goal I know many others learned and felt the same way as well. AGR's are the salt of the earth men in Green and Gold.

My first experience of the AGR house was during my senior year in High School when a trusted friend of our family and local Basketball Star Judy Miller offered to give me a Saturday Tour of Bowling Green and Western's Campus.

Judy asked my parents and they agreed that it would be good for me to know how to get around Bowling Green, learn the layout of the Campus, where to go and who to see if I had questions or needed some help getting registered for the Fall of 89 Classes at Western.

Neither one of my parents had ever been to college so this was a huge load off their minds.

Judy introduced me to Bowling Green, Western’s Campus and as a Little Sis, She Introduced me to Her Brothers at The AGR House.

Judy had saved the best introductions for last. As a High School Senior Farm Boy. I was being introduced to an entirely different world I had been told nothing of substance about and I looked forward to the experience of a lifetime.

It was on a Saturday in the Fall. We had seen all the popular spots in BG, on Western's Campus and spent the Afternoon grilling burgers, hotdogs with some cold beer on the deck of the AGR House.

I finished the night helping Kent Stewart, Bob Moorman along with several others Polish Off the last of a Saturday Night Keg telling stories, talking about AGR, Intramural Sports, Greek Week, College Courses, Professors at Western, who and who not to take and the AGR secret test file which would give a brother more time for his chosen extracurricular activities.

Wow, the Weekend flew by. I was having a blast, meeting more people than I could ever recall by name but the time Judy took from her busy schedule for her little green man (Judy’s nicknamed me as a kid when I played baseball with her younger brother. Judy recognised yes, I was little and I was green) introducing me to those who Judy knew I would come to know over the next few years in BG really resonated with me especially those I was privileged to meet at the AGR House.

Judy knew everyone we met by name, she even took time that Saturday in the Fall of 1988 to personally introduce me to the Red Barn Staff by name on our way to our next stop.

I remember Judy said Chad, you will get to know these guys here at Red Barn really well next year.

You will be making a lot of trips up here next year, running errands for other people and most importantly will be for picking up the kegs on Thursday nights at the House. Before I had a chance to intervene with a question? Judy interjected and said. Oh, and little green man (Judy’s nickname for me as a kid) don’t forget to pull around after you order at the window to the back door and fill the yellow tub full of ice while they are loading the keg for you as she casually stepped into the backdoor waved to the staff and showed me the ice machine.

I wasn’t exactly sure what Judy was preparing me for but Judy knew and she didn’t want me to be unprepared.

Well after Red Barn it was a straight shot down Chestnut Street to the AGR House. Which we made our final destination and resting spot for the remainder of that day and night.

I never forgot the time I got to spend with those cordial and most welcoming guys Judy introduced me to on the deck of the AGR House on a Saturday Night in the Fall of 1988 as a High School Senior. Would later become my brothers. Thanks to Judy Miller.

My parents were impressed with the facts that AGR’s had the #1 GPA on Campus, mandated study hours for pledges and helped get any brother who was struggling with a particular subject and got brothers back on track who had lost focus by pulling a low GPA the previous semester but insisted for me to establish one thing at a time by first adjusting to life away from home at college and when I had first made that adjustment then we would discuss adapting to life in a fraternity.

I agreed with my parents and waited until my second semester to pledge. The deal I made with my parents was first to prove to them I was serious about earning a degree by passing all my classes the first semester. I did in the fall of 89 with a 2.75 GPA.

What my parents saw as separate lifestyles, I counted as one and the same. College was only worth the time I spent passing courses because I remained an active AGR. What I know now, without our AGR Commodity, AGR Brothers and lifestyle experiences the fraternity makes available to its actives. I would have said heck with all of this studying because I didn’t find much joy in college classes alone without the extracurricular activities that kept me involved in campus life through the fraternity.

Without it, I would have left school early, gone home for work and never enjoyed the satisfaction and respect an Alumni receives after they have proven themselves worthy of a college degree.

My parents later told me on my graduation day from Western in May of 94.

They never expected me to graduate college but they were really happy I was able to prove them wrong. Mom said it was the best Mother’s Day Gift She had ever received. That was a Hallmark moment for me.

I took notes in class, studied the books for each course, and with some help from the AGR House Test File was able to successfully navigate my way to a B.S. Degree with good grades and enjoy all the extracurricular activities that came with keeping everyone happy at home.

So it made sense to finish what was started by remaining in school and finally earn a B.S. while along the way enjoying time after the work was finished for the day by getting involved in campus life as an AGR.

Playing every intramural sport, time to lift weights, greek week and spring break as an AGR.

While on the bench press my thoughts that drove me were Tug of War, Girls and Spring Break on the Beach with my shirt off.

Frank Kilgore pictured here at South Padre Beach with a Shovel he just took from some guy building a Sand Castle.

Frank always liked to dig a moat around our buried beach keg. Then we would hoist up the AGR Flag. Frank and I were in South Padre for Spring Break 92, 93 & 94. By 1994 we convinced several to make the trip with us.

Back at The House. We Love a Good Foosball Game. We Love it even more when we beat our opponents 10 - 0. Mandatory House Rules that the team that gets shut out must crawl to Snell Hall and Back, kissing the front step before re-entering an upright position.

Corey Givens caught here doing the crawl to Snell Hall. Per Tradition if you are shut out in foosball then you owe a crawl. I feel his pain. Knowing from my own crawl When Our Pledge Class Lost 40 to 0 to Kent and Iglehart. We were all formally introduced to the crawl.

My Class pledged in the spring of 1990.

The Actives nicknamed Our Pledge Class; The P.U.I. (Pledging Under the Influence) Eight.

We had a few run ins with the authorities during our pledge ship...

I recall at least a few times different Authorities being particularly unimpressed with the “PUI 8”.

From our handsome pledge classes collection of Panties representing our time well spent serenading young ladies down in the Valley of the Dolls, to our consumption of particular weeknight beverages to our unique style of camaraderie developed while fulfilling our pledge task list as only four guys from Breckinridge County, two from Hancock County and last but not least Our Two Brothers from New Jersey.

We all bonded as this particular band of naïve misfits could be molded together all working as one unit, with one thought, one purpose and one goal of being a part of The AGR’s Brothers of AX.

Under (Brad Sisk) Our Pledge Trainers Leadership, we were told we could pledge all semester like the class before us if we chose to but “Sysco” recommended getting tough, sleeping once we were in and getting mean with our given task list.

Under Sysco’s Leadership The PUI 8 quickly developed the No Fear Policy and began accomplishing our list with amazing speed.

Even though we will always be pledges in some actives eyes. Our Tasks were completed in six weeks and four days. We even made it our proud duty to add a few tasks to the list under Sysco’s Supervision of course.

Extra-Curricular Activities such as dragging particular JA’s naked through the sand pit, even some were tied to trees and the flag pole.

We were so wired we would even dance around them like wild injun’s so no one would untie them.

Yes, Sir, the PUI Point was being made by The Class of Eight.

We had become one, we had what it took, we wanted the Green and The Gold, We Were Going to Be AGR’s and were ready to run through barbed wire to get there.

A week or so later we were individually Interrogated, stripped, blindfolded, bound then Hurled into the back of an open air cattle trailer headed for parts unknown.

Not knowing what had just happened or what was next this would be a night we would all remember.

Hell Night, just so happen to land on the coldest, wettest, thirty something degrees, rainy night right after a good helping of spaghetti dinner had been served by us pledges of course. We would get our spaghetti dinner later on that night maybe early mourning.

Every Task in Each Place We Were Always Proud to Represent the Green and Gold. Even Loved Singing “we are a bunch of bastards” upon the front lawns of each and every fraternity on Campus.

We wanted them to know who would be proudly carrying on our Politically Incorrect, AGR Tradition’s the next four years with No Fear were formerly introducing ourselves.