By Randy Willis Perhaps I should explain in more detail. Without Louisiana College there may never have been the classic hit song "You Are My Sunshine. " The year was 1920 and the son of a poor sharecropper from the now-ghost town of Beech Springs in north Louisiana decided he wanted to get an education. His family was so poor that he did not have a bed in which to sleep until he was nine years old. Upon graduation from high school, he began the task of choosing a college. One of his neighbors had something called a college catalogue. Later he would recall, “I was amazed and believed you could order a college just as you ordered something from Sears. I’d never seen a college, had never been on a college campus, but I read it and it told all about Louisiana College at Pineville. I decided that’s where I would try to go.” The college had been established just fourteen years before in 1906. But how could he pay for tuition, books, housing, and food? He didn't have any money or know anyone that did, so he decided to try and get a job at the college. On his second day on campus he went to the college employment office and found a job in the soon to be named Hattie B. Strother Cafeteria. Hattie was the beloved dean of … [Read more...]