This is truly a historic occasion for all of us -- for you, I know that this is the first reunion of the descendants of Taylor Duke and it is an extraordinary accomplishment. You are to be congratulated! Bill King tells me that thanks to the Duke Family Association he has been able to trace the sixth, seventh, and eighth generations of the Taylor Duke family on his marvelous computerized genealogical charts. Tracing family history, preserving and learning from it is one of the outcomes of reunions like this one, and it is a very important way of filling in our nation's history with the stories of individual lives and contributions that the broader sweep of history often misses, and in missing, loses some of the truth of our lives as a people.

Duke University is proud to help you celebrate a hardworking Southern farm family, who did their civic duty, took responsibility for their community and supported their church. They also raised ten children to whom they passed on these virtues, and if Taylor Duke and Dicey Jones were not obviously different from their North Carolina neighbors of the early nineteenth century, clearly something a little out of the ordinary went with their genes, something that pushed their children a little harder, that took commitment to their beliefs a little farther than most.

The good that Duke University has been able to do for others follows from the same direct line that brings you all together here this weekend. In other words, I don't think it's too fanciful to conclude that you and Duke University must be cousins! Because in a very special way we do share this Duke heritage. So please know how welcome you are here, and let the University be common ground for you, a place to bring the family together, to save family history, to savor family history, and to help future generations maintain their ties and not lose each other again.

This is truly a historic occasion for all of us -- for you, I know that this is the first reunion of the descendants of Taylor Duke and it is an extraordinary accomplishment. You are to be congratulated! Bill King tells me that thanks to the Duke Family Association he has been able to trace the sixth, seventh, and eighth generations of the Taylor Duke family on his marvelous computerized genealogical charts. Tracing family history, preserving and learning from it is one of the outcomes of reunions like this one, and it is a very important way of filling in our nation's history with the stories of individual lives and contributions that the broader sweep of history often misses, and in missing, loses some of the truth of our lives as a people.

Duke University is proud to help you celebrate a hardworking Southern farm family, who did their civic duty, took responsibility for their community and supported their church. They also raised ten children to whom they passed on these virtues, and if Taylor Duke and Dicey Jones were not obviously different from their North Carolina neighbors of the early nineteenth century, clearly something a little out of the ordinary went with their genes, something that pushed their children a little harder, that took commitment to their beliefs a little farther than most.

The good that Duke University has been able to do for others follows from the same direct line that brings you all together here this weekend. In other words, I don't think it's too fanciful to conclude that you and Duke University must be cousins! Because in a very special way we do share this Duke heritage. So please know how welcome you are here, and let the University be common ground for you, a place to bring the family together, to save family history, to savor family history, and to help future generations maintain their ties and not lose each other again.

All in all, it looked like your typical family reunion -- long-lost relatives from all over streaming in the door in dripping raincoats, white-haired great-aunts remembering when the one with children of her own was a child herself; people peering first at nametags, then at faces, with cries of recognition.

But there was something slightly different about this reunion -- the host was Duke University, represented by President Keith Brodie and his wife, Brenda, and the family was the Dukes (Angiers, Biddies and Roneys), the descendants of Taylor Duke, traced to the eighth generation. And it was definitely a day for the Dukes, despite the rain: Duke had just upset Clemson, and on the following day, the Duke Tobacco Museum would be dedicated.

In fact. that dedication was the inspiration for the reunion that had been in the planning stages for a year and a half. Angier Biddle Duke and Newton Duke Angier were overwhelmed by the more than 200 descendants who came from as far away as California and Texas, so the two organization men devised a color-coded nametag system that would help identify the branches of that prolific tree: blue for Dukes, red for Angiers, green for Biddles and yellow for Roneys.

Some sported more than one color. but the system proved to be more of a springboard for launching into family stories than a line of demarcation. For this was, above all, one very big, happy family, greeted graciously and lovingly by Mary and Jim Semans and Angier and Robin Duke.

For all the famous names and faces, it was a lovely family occasion and a lovely family, and when Janet Peele offered to adopt me for the weekend, I gave it some serious thought.

All in all, it looked like your typical family reunion -- long-lost relatives from all over streaming in the door in dripping raincoats, white-haired great-aunts remembering when the one with children of her own was a child herself; people peering first at nametags, then at faces, with cries of recognition.

But there was something slightly different about this reunion -- the host was Duke University, represented by President Keith Brodie and his wife, Brenda, and the family was the Dukes (Angiers, Biddies and Roneys), the descendants of Taylor Duke, traced to the eighth generation. And it was definitely a day for the Dukes, despite the rain: Duke had just upset Clemson, and on the following day, the Duke Tobacco Museum would be dedicated.

In fact. that dedication was the inspiration for the reunion that had been in the planning stages for a year and a half. Angier Biddle Duke and Newton Duke Angier were overwhelmed by the more than 200 descendants who came from as far away as California and Texas, so the two organization men devised a color-coded nametag system that would help identify the branches of that prolific tree: blue for Dukes, red for Angiers, green for Biddles and yellow for Roneys.

Some sported more than one color. but the system proved to be more of a springboard for launching into family stories than a line of demarcation. For this was, above all, one very big, happy family, greeted graciously and lovingly by Mary and Jim Semans and Angier and Robin Duke.

For all the famous names and faces, it was a lovely family occasion and a lovely family, and when Janet Peele offered to adopt me for the weekend, I gave it some serious thought.

Taylor Duke would have been proud as well, since the reunion marked the 100th anniversary of his family's involvement with Duke University and its forerunner, Trinity College, an involvement which remains strong today.

His son, Washington Duke, and grandson, Benjamin Newton Duke were key leaders in the 1889 move of Trinity College from Randolph County to Durham. Thirty-six years later, in 1925, another of Taylor Duke's grandsons, James Buchanan Duke, endowed the educational institution and it was renamed in honor of his father, Washington.

Family members -- Dukes, Biddies, Angiers, Lyons, Staggs and Roneys -- came from all parts of the country to participate in the reunion.

The week-end's activities began with a picnic lunch, served on the lawn of the Duke Alumni House prior to the Duke-Clemson football game. The game proved to be an occasion all its own, with Steve Spurrier's Blue Devils pulling the national upset of the day by defeating the Clemson Tigers on a rain-soaked field.

Duke President Dr. Keith Brodie and his wife, Brenda, welcomed the reunion guests at a lovely post-game reception at The President's House.

Highlight of the week-end was an elegant dinner Saturday night at the Washington Duke inn. Angier Biddle Duke, founder of the Duke Family Association and co-chairman of the reunion. gave a stirring address, the text of which is printed herein.

Newton Duke Angier. reunion co-chairman served as master of ceremonies. He told how the Duke Family Association of North Carolina came into being and related many family stories. He later circulated among the tables to enable each dinner guest to be introduced.

The eleven o'clock Sunday service at Duke University Chapel welcomed the Duke Family Association. Benjamin Duke Holloway. Duke University Trustee, served as lector. He is a great-great grandson of William Duke, who served John and Charles Wesley as a lay preacher in the earliest days of Methodism.

Following the Chapel service a picnic had been scheduled for the lawn of the Duke Homestead, now a State Park, to include the dedication of the New Tobacco Museum located on the property. Unfortunately, the rain continued to pour and this event was hastily moved to the Bryan Center adjacent to the Chapel.

"Now. I would like the following to stand and remain so for a few minutes: Angier Biddle Duke. Newton Duke Angier. Jr.. Angier St. George Biddle Duke, Angier Biddle Duke, Jr., Anthony Drexel Duke. Malbourne Anthony Angier. Anthony Drexel Duke, Jr.

"On the appointed day, Angier, who was Commissioner of Public Events for the City of New York, arrived from a previous duty. The Maitre'd approached him effusing delight to have received his reservation, to which Angier replied that it wasn't his party but his cousin’s, Duke Angier.

"When I arrived with Duke and about the same time as Tony, the Maitre'd approached my son and said, ‘Are you Mr. Duke or Mr. Angier’, to which he replied, ‘I am Duke Angier, this is my cousin, Angier Duke, this is my father, Duke Angier, this is my cousin, Tony Duke and I have a brother at home named Tony Angier.’

"Somewhat taken aback, the Maitre'd said, 'Your family seems to have run out of names in a hurry'. To which Duke shot back with, 'Well, if you have a good name -- use it!'

"If you gentlemen had been with me, I would have said, "I am Duke Angier, this is my cousin, Angier Duke, this is my son, Duke Angier, Jr., and my cousin's sons, Angier Duke, and Angier Duke, Jr., and my cousin Tony Duke, my son, Tony Angier, my cousin, Tony Duke, Jr., and over in the University Room are Tony Duke III and Tony Angier. Jr.'

Duke served in the US. Foreign Service from 1949 until his retirement in 1981. He was Ambassador to Spain, Morocco, El Salvador and Denmark and was Chief of Protocol for the White House and Department of State under Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson.

This magical evening brings us together at a star-crossed time: it is the last great event of Duke's Sesquicentennial Year, and it celebrates as well the Centennial Anniversary of our family's accredited association with the institution that now bears its name. Just one hundred years ago Washington Duke accepted the invitation of Trinity's Board of Trustees to co-chair, with Julian Carr, the Building Committee which was to move the college to Durham. His son, Ben, had already become a Trustee of Trinity earlier in that same year: 1889.

And so here we are 100 years later, marveling and wondering at the implications of what was then set in motion.

Parenthetically, let me observe that it is the tradition of leading American families to follow a pattern: first, early struggles, then growing success, culminating in a triumphant period followed by a decline to ultimate obscurity. During the next one hundred years, is that to be our fate? Very possibly. But I ask you to bear in mind that you and I have one incomparable asset which no force of fortune or of nature nor of economic, political or social change can ever deprive us. We all belong to the family that established Duke University.

As the University grows from being a great regional institution to national stature and now is emerging on the world scene as a prime force in global education, each one of us must feel somehow enhanced.

I have often wondered whether the spark of genius that propels a man or woman to greatness will ever reappear in subsequent generations. For us who bear the genes of Washington and his father, Taylor, and of his sons, Ben and Buck, is there a chance the thunder will roll again? I look searchingly into the faces and lives of my beloved and treasured children and grandchildren to discern a trace of that indefinable spark that would signify a genetic regeneration. I haven't found it yet; but I continue to have hopes; they may be late developers, I tell myself; and furthermore, my dear daughter is pregnant.

But let us put things in perspective. I was speculating about the next hundred years. In our generation the thunder rolls still. Look at Ben Duke Holloway lighting up the sky for Equitable in New York and London. He is here with us tonight as Chairman of the Investment Committee of the University's Board of Trustees. As such, Cousin Ben presides over the financial destiny of Duke. This very hostelry. which is our home for the evening, is his very own creation. It is a beautiful one and it performs a long-needed role as the University's premier facility for visitors, parents, and alumni. Our Duke Family Association will monitor and improve the exhibit of memorabilia that is here on display. Our Reunion photograph will be a prominent part of it soon.

The thunder rolls for my brother, Tony, who has manned the barricades of racial and social justice for the past half century. He founded Boys Harbor and still guides it; he has been a Trustee of Duke for 13 years and during that time he has influenced the lives of many young people as Chairman of the Student Committee. Furthermore, as head of a special panel, he has saved Duke Forest from commercial exploitation for the foreseeable future. He is here with most of his 28 children and grandchildren, two of whom bear the historic names of Washington and James B. We'll meet them all in a little while.

Our generation will not go out with a whimper -- but with a thunderclap -- as long as Cousin Mary Semans is around. She is not only the anchor of the whole family, the steadfast guardian of the flame, but a dazzling meteor illuminating the lives of all who know her. Relevant to us tonight Cousin Mary has been a Trustee for many years and continues to advance the University from her high post of Chairman of the Duke Endowment. Dear Mary, we salute you!

"What's Past is Prologue" said Shakespeare and for us that is a comforting maxim. In that spirit we can face our future with the kind of curious wonderment that caused the oft-quoted declaration from my great grandfather that "There are 3 things I could never understand: electricity, the Holy Ghost, and my son Buck."

We are bound together by ties of blood and history and tonight we forge them closer in friendship. It is now our responsibility to keep together, to keep going, and keep the thunder rolling. Just as Napoleon said that every legionnaire carries a marshal's baton in his knapsack, so can we affirm that every one of us carries within us the genes of Taylor and Washington. Ben and Buck, the Roneys, the Angiers, the Staggs, and the Lyons.

However. not Pet hung up on genealogy as an end in itself. We are not ancestor worshipers: we do recall with respect Henry Cooper's observation that "A man who thinks too much about his ancestors is like a potato -- the best part of him is underground."

The feelings I experienced the weekend of the first Duke Family Reunion are akin to those I'm having now at Christmas time – expectancy, eagerness -- much like a small child waiting impatiently for Christmas morning.

As soon as I entered the door of the Washington Duke Inn, I felt a spirit of warmth, friendliness, hospitality. It was in the air! Just as at Christmas. My sister. Angela Johnston from Hershey, Pennsylvania, was with me, and we agreed immediately -- even before we registered -- that we were indeed glad we had come. Ruby and Bill Smith from Roanoke, Virginia, just ahead of us, said they felt the same way. We all sensed, and correctly, that this was going to be a happy "memory-making" weekend.

Right away we began meeting "new" cousins and greeting some we already knew, including those handsome Holloway "boys'* and their attractive wives. Also Carolyn and Piper Belvin from Elizabeth City.

At this stage in my life I enjoy mixed groups, as this one was -- the very young, older children, teens, young adults, older adults (my category). We complement each other. On Saturday evening I was pleased to be seated near a table of the very small ones, with the big, famous names. They were a precious lot.

The planning Committee for the reunion did a tremendous job. It was evident all through the weekend. And Newt Angier and Angier Duke were superb masters of ceremony on Saturday evening, as we learned a little about each other and heard some interesting and humorous family stories. Their graciousness and the loving kindness of Mary Semans and her immediate family made all of us feel welcome and included in the larger Duke family.

We know now that the values, dreams, and plans of our forefathers for higher education are still alive and in good hands. To feel the thrill of this, look up some night at the lighted tower of the Duke Chapel and the stars beyond, and reflect on the thought that this beautiful cathedral is at the center of a great university, our university. God bless you all, and Happy Holidays!

Dear Dad,

Your comment at the family association dinner in Durham on September 30 that the family may fall into obscurity was fatherly and charming. It's a concern I've heard from you a hundred times.

But of all the remarks you made, that one makes me terribly nervous. You were talking about us youngsters. We know we have big shoes to fill. But it may be a few generations before we produce any baseball- anchormen, New York Times writers or college presidents.

You've always harped on success and achievement. I can't escape feelings of inadequacy in this family of descendants of ambassadors, university founders, high-stepping socialites and philanthropists (a very strange concept indeed). Yet as the rest of us disappear into relative obscurity, the achievements of our forefathers serve not only as legacy but also a, a stigma.

The legacy is a wonderful sense of hope that men, women and their wealth can have a positive impact on their world. Universities. camps for inner-city youths, hotels. friendships and countless other contributions etched in the annals of history are the legacies of the headline-makers of the family. The stigma is that somehow all of us are blessed with the golden touch, the ability to do it just like our forefathers, which makes failure all the harder to swallow. And of course there is that erroneous belief that we're all rich. Ah! If only great-great-granddaddy and his sons hadn't endowed that university, then we'd be talking.

To return to Duke rekindles all the complex pride and misgivings I felt when I was a Young student, wondering if I was blessed with admission on my own merits or the luck of ancestral draw. Although even then I had some degree of joyful obscurity. there were times, like when teachers screwed up their mouths and brows in disbelief to read my name on the class roster. that I became an unhappy celebrity. There are no words to express the mixture of angst and joy I felt at being distinguished for name alone.

I also always found it rather odd that whenever you visited you hoarded DUKE memorabilia, something I made a point of avoiding. You bought and used Duke umbrellas, T-shirts, sweat-shirts, cups, date books, and anything the university printed with our name on it.

It wasn't until I returned this October that I felt the same urge to have my own name across my chest on a sweatshirt, a kind of garish remainder of my ancestry and college years. Removed from it all now, the DUKE gear is all that I have -- except of course my wonderful education -- to remind me of the institution, and then the amazing and wonderful association that developed between the family and Durham, where I was intricately connected for four years.

I saw that many others in the family felt the same way. The weekend in October, from my point of view, was a celebration of the wonderful lack of obscurity that blessed our family for several generations. Wealth and power passes. But not the pride in those old glory days. Winning that football game against Clemson was everything, even though I never checked another score all season. And all the young faces, and alumni, were proud too. They cheered that name. DUKE. Hah! Obscurity.

I would have liked a newspaper or one of those society magazines, whose pages you and Tony seem to grace frequently, to have unleashed one of their writers on the event. It was the real Duke family story. That was it. Good old North Carolina family getting together in the fine Methodist tradition of their forefathers: No wine at dinner, and the party was over by ten o'clock.

Your comments about obscurity, however, would have been pulled out as the most newsworthy. I see it now: "Former Ambassador, heir to Duke Tobacco Fortune, says family members may never duplicate achievements."

I have nightmares about it. But for the time being, no matter what happens, your presence and achievements guarantee us some fame.

When I was studying at New York University two years ago, for example, dating my future wife, Town and Country Magazine held me up as one of the most eligible bachelors in New York, along with twenty or so bankers and others whose society connections and achievements can be far better established. Why, you ask, did the magazine choose me? Because I am " "the son of …" " There is an obnoxious little Junior at the end of my name.

A year or so later the magazine ran a photograph of Marilu, a rather reclusive member of the family who lives at the end of a 20 mile dirt road, blocked by 15 locked gates, in the mountains of central California. She also seemed an odd choice for Town and Country. The caption said she breeds Peruvian Paso Fino horses in California. They didn't lie. As you know, your daughter owns four of them.

So obscurity may not be our immediate problem: achievements and success may be. Some of us are, or will, undoubtedly make a fine fortune, or enough to afford a few day's stay at the Washington Duke Inn. Nevertheless we will rarely achieve the sort of significance that you were probably referring to. Your comments served as an intimidating reminder of that.

Dad, I noticed that a store here was selling underwear with "Donald Trump" emblazoned across the seat. He's an achiever, certainly not obscure. Isn't there Duke Blue Devil's underwear yet? Will you order me a pair?

First, the organization should be the repository of family records and memorabilia. The Secretariat, particularly Bill King, University Archivist, is prepared to preserve the record of marriages, births, deaths. career and address changes, honors, publications. Letters and diaries, as well as photographs, could also be included in this central repository as a permanent record for future generations.

The Family Association will encourage our children and grandchildren to attend Duke. It will assist members with admission procedures, provide information about scholarships currently available and advise on how to apply for them.

A long-term goal, according to Duke, might well be the establishment of a full scholarship for a member's son or daughter in need of financial aid.

He suggested an annual newsletter bringing membership up to date on family activities and news.

Another goal is to plan future family gatherings, perhaps a luncheon or dinner each year and a reunion in three to five years.

He stressed that the association is not a fundraising organization. There will be no annual dues, for example. However. since we are not subsidized in any way by the university our initial recourse will be to request donations of any amount to cover future mailings concerned with activities or interests of the association. These donations may be made to the permanent association office and will be gratefully received at 341 Perkins Library, Durham, North Carolina 27706. This is also the address for any memorabilia you elect to submit. Any questions should be addressed to this office or by calling 919-684-5637.