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‘A little humor helps’

On May 8, Joseph Ferrell will take part in his final Commencement as he retires from this secretary of the faculty position, ending his long tenure of citation reading, which has become a yearly tradition in its own right.

Joe Ferrell

When Joseph Ferrell stepped to the Kenan Stadium podium for his first commencement as secretary of the faculty in 1996, he quickly realized something was a bit amiss.

“I started reading the citation and the students started reading along with me,” Ferrell said. “As soon as I realized what they were doing I started reading the sentences in a different sequence. They didn’t know what sentence I was going to read next.”

For two decades, Ferrell has deviated from the drab by adding his characteristic wit, personalized touch — and Northeastern North Carolina drawl — to the yearly honorary doctorate citations.

“I have sat through too many boring ceremonies like this before,” he said. “I think a little humor helps.”

Throughout the years, his citations have become a Commencement trademark.

But on May 8, Ferrell will partake in his final Commencement as he retires from this secretary of the faculty position, ending his long tenure of citation reading, which has become a yearly tradition in its own right.

“That’s what happens when you hang around for too long,” he said. “In colleges, if you do something twice it becomes a tradition.”

Ferrell first arrived at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as a first-year student back in 1956 to earn his bachelor’s and then law degree, and only strayed away for one year to earn his masters of laws from Yale. He returned in 1964 to become a faculty member.

After four decades as a professor of public law and government at the School of Government, Ferrell retired in 2002 to focus on his role as the Office of Faculty Governance’s secretary of the faculty.

Among the many duties included in the secretary of faculty position is maintaining all nominations and citations for honorary degrees and other special awards at Commencement and University Day. Over the course of two decades, Ferrell has given out close to 200 distinguished alumnus awards and honorary doctorates.

“I love it,” he said. “It’s the best part of my job. I really enjoy it.”

In his role, Ferrell has bumped shoulders with Nobel Prize laureates, mayors, authors, actors and musicians. One of his favorite interactions was with folk singer Doc Watson.

“I walked up to him and said ‘Doc, I’m the fella who gets to say all the nice things about you, and would really like to get an autograph on my program.’ He said ‘Well, son, you can say anything you want to about me except don’t call me a living legend,’” Ferrell remembered.

The citation writing process, Ferrell said, has become easier over the years, but is still time consuming. He begins writing them during winter break.

“You have to say everything you want to say in 350 words,” he said. “The trick is you don’t want a citation that seems short, but they can’t be long either. So there’s a balance of how to say what’s really important and outstanding about this person without going too long.”

The length of citations is always a concern. Always taking place before the Commencement Address, Ferrell said his contribution to the ceremony is just about when students begin to become anxious and inpatient.

“The ceremony can get kind of long and drawn out,” he said. “It’s a hot day, everybody’s sitting up there sweating and sweltering under these academic robes so on the stage I try to hold what I say to 150 words.”

Adding in his wit and humor also breaks up the monotony. The key, he said, is finding the right person to be playful with. One his favorite citations was former Duke President Nannerl O. Keohane in 2005.

“I said ‘Nan Keohane has been in Kenan Stadium many times before, we trust this occasion is more joyous for her than most of those,’” Ferrell recalled.

After Ferrell reads his final citations at Commencement on May 8, he will pass that duty to the new secretary of the faculty, Vin Steponaitis.

It will officially end a 20-year tradition that Ferrell never really intended to create in the first place.

“I never took any lessons, and I never practice,” he said cracking a smile. “I just get up there and read them in my Northeastern North Carolina dialect, which everybody seems to think is so clever.”