Repository: UIHistories Project: Dedication - Memorial Stadium [PAGE 23]

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V O sons of pioneers, who sleep beneath The tenderly chanting stars, Blanketed by a scarlet-poppied heath, Or by a goldenrodded plain,— And sons of Illinois who knew the pain Of ragged bleeding scars, Upon whose groping brain Was seared with molten rain Of death the holocaust of wars— O victorious living, and glorious living-dead, Know that a legion, loyal, reverent, For you has reared a mighty monument Of stadium and colonnade, outspread Upon the bosom of the prairie like a flower, A flower eloquent With the wistful beauty of your dreams And the splendor of your power,— A rugged monument that gleams With memorial columns that aspire Like living souls afire With spiritual fervor and desire,— Whose pillared walls, upthrown And lifted from the prairie clod, Go leaping through the goldenrod, And up the sky to God,— An enduring prayer for you, a prayer in steel and stone. VI O sons of Illinois, and sons of sons To be, and sons of Illini's loyal band That marches ever onward through the land With a stalwart martial manner, Beneath the blue and orange banner Of learning and of labor, Spiked are the roaring guns, And sheathed the bloody saber; -{25 >-