A group of UD alumni from the Class of 1963 take “Blue Hens Forever” to heart. Their friendship that started on the upper floors of Kent Hall continues 60 years later through annual reunions they organize. The group’s get-togethers have been a tradition they’ve held onto since about 1970, except for a small break during the pandemic.

“Our enduring friendship is one of the biggest takeaways from our UD experience,” said Sandy Scheibe, AS63. “The commonality of our experience at UD in the dorm together, that binds us for a lifetime.”

Scheibe said that it took a few years after graduation to get the reunions started since it was a busy time in everyone’s lives, remembering that she took her daughter in a baby carrier to the first reunion.

“At our peak, we had around 17 in the group. Over the years, a few ladies relocated or weren’t able to come due to health reasons and we picked up others in our class from neighboring dorms.”

After UD, the alumni went on to have a variety of successful careers, in fields such as nursing, education, real estate, social work, public relations, merchandising, banking, and facility design and management.

“We are together in so many ways through UD, but we all took a path that suited our different talents and personalities,” Scheibe said.

The group spends much of their time together reminiscing about their college years such as:

• the playbill performances that students in each dorm participated in;
• when female students were serenaded outside of their dorms by fraternity brothers to celebrate a “pinning;”
• how different it was when men were not welcome in women’s dorms;
• the fact that there were no inter-collegiate sports for women; or
• how their only phone contact with the outside world was a single pay phone at the end of the hall.

Many in the group are still located in Delaware, with some in Maryland and Pennsylvania, so they gather locally, most recently at a country club in Dover in September 2023. A few of them stay connected with UD in other ways—through season tickets to Delaware football games and attending other UD events, such as their 50th reunion on campus 10 years ago.

“We’ve all experienced the progression of life together,” Scheibe said. “Unanimously, we agree that UD provided us with the foundation that set us on track for a successful life. We all look back positively on our UD experiences and appreciatively for 60 years of friendship.”