Homecoming
Graduates cherish warmth of college life
Family legacies sweeten return to KU
FOND MEMORIES OF OLD FRIENDS, FROM FAR AND NEAR, WILL beckon many alumni back to the University this weekend for homecoming.
"Fall always gets you to start thinking about old KU friends and remembering being up on the Hill," said Sara Dickey Goodburn, a 1986 journalism graduate. Goodburn's family, like many others, has its own established homecoming traditions.
Goodburn said that her first memories of homecoming were working on floats for the parade. While attending KU, Goodburn was a member of the Alpha Delta Phi sorority.
"I remember one year we were working on a float with the Sigma Phi Epsilon," she said. "We were up
We'd have all five of my sisters camped out on our dorm room floor. It was
great.
SUSAN BORESOW one of six sisters who attended KU
very late finishing it. I just remember being so exhausted when we finally finished."
Goodburn said going to the homecoming game was a family tradition for her that started when she was very
young.
"Just ask Dad about homecoming, and he always talks about the year Baby Jay was born," Goodburn said.
Baby Jay was 'born' during the 1972 homecoming game where he was wheeled on to the field and celebrated his first birthday.
Goodburn is a fifth generation KU graduate. Her father, David Dickey, graduated from KU in 1956 with a business degree. Goodburn's grandmother, Flora Bigsby, graduated from KU in 1928 with a bachelor's degree in collegiate studies. Goodburn's great grandfather and her great-great grandmother also were KU graduates.
Another family enriched by KU memories and traditions is the Boresow family, which had 14 children attend KU. Five of the family's six daughters talked about their experiences.
Susan Boresow, the oldest of the daughters, now the marketing manager for a St. Louis corporation. "Homecoming was always a very special occasion for us. All five of my sisters would always come up for that," she said.
"My sisters were always the belles of the ball at the dorm," said Boresow, a 1982 graduate. "They got all kinds of attention."
Boresow said that she and her sisters made a lot of friends because of homecoming activities.
"There were dorm plays that were put on that we'd go see; we'd order pizza, play ball outside—there'd be water balloon fights," she said. "It was always a lot of fun."
"We'd have all five of my sisters camped out on our dorm room floor sleeping in sleeping bags. It was great. It was always a special time," she said.
Boresow said that she always felt a strong sense of welcome and belonging at KU.
Her sisters Sara, a speech language and hearing major, and Rebecca, a 1994 graduate, also said they enjoyed working on the floats.
"We'd work on them for weeks at a time," Sara said. "There'd be music playing in the background. It was more of a social setting."
When you get back, you realize how great it was to be here versus being in the real world
world.
REBECCA BORESOW one of six sisters who attended KU
Rebecca said that she found the parade exciting both then and now.
Homecoming means even more to sister Jennifer now that she has graduated and is teaching junior high in the Shawnee Mission school district.
"When you get back, you realize how great it was
to be here versus being out in the real world," she said. "It's a real homecoming. You really are coming home."
—BY AMY BUSTER
22 Homecoming
Hill • October 11, 1995