Former Gov. George Nigh has delivered graduation speeches for decades. For year 75, he's returning to his alma mater

Former Gov. George Nigh is returning to his collegiate alma mater this week to deliver a commencement address for a 75th straight year.

Nigh, now 96, will be the featured speaker at East Central University in Ada on Saturday for the 10 a.m. ceremony at the Kerr Activities Center. ECU officials said 322 bachelor’s degrees are scheduled to be granted.

“I started out at ECU, so I think it’s wonderful I’m making my 75th commencement there,” Nigh said. “It’s an anniversary.”

Nigh's appearance at a graduation ceremony has become a rite of spring in Oklahoma. In some years, he’s delivered as many as 20 graduation addresses. His first such speech came in 1950 at a rural two-room, eighth-grade schoolhouse known as Plainview, located north of Arpelar in Pittsburg County. Nigh, then a senior at ECU, was running for the state Legislature but didn’t have a car, so he hitchhiked to the ceremony.

Former Gov. George Nigh has not missed a year of graduation speeches

Each year since, Nigh has spoken somewhere in Oklahoma. His itinerary in recent years has included Rogers State University in Claremore in 2010, Redlands Community College in El Reno in 2011, Oklahoma Christian University in north Oklahoma City in 2012 and Clinton High School in 2015. Two years later, he spoke at the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond, where he served as president from 1992 to 1997. The next year, it was at his prep alma mater, McAlester High School.

He delivered recorded remarks for Epic Charter School’s online ceremony during the COVID-19 pandemic graduation of 2020. It was back to UCO for an in-person 2021 address.

“We are extremely excited that Gov. George Nigh has decided to return to his alma mater, East Central University, to commemorate 75 years of commencement addresses,” ECU President Wendell Godwin said. “Gov. Nigh is proof that ECU graduates can do anything they set their mind to. Or, as Governor Nigh says when he is on campus, ‘You can get there from here.’”

From McAlester, Nigh served in the U.S. Navy before graduating from ECU in 1950, the same year he began a 32-year career in public office, serving as a Democrat in the state House of Representatives. Among his top legislative accomplishments was introducing a bill that designated the song “Oklahoma!,” from the musical of the same name, as Oklahoma’s state song.

In 1958, the 31-year-old Nigh became the youngest lieutenant governor in Oklahoma history. He served four different times as governor, earning election in 1978 and 1982 to that office — making him the first Oklahoma governor to be reelected. He also served out the brief unexpired terms for then-Gov. J. Howard Edmondson and then-Gov. David Boren, both of whom resigned early to go to the U.S. Senate.

ECU named Nigh as a Distinguished Alumnus in 1977 and in 1989, the Oklahoma Hall of Fame inducted Nigh.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Former Gov. George Nigh to extend graduation-speech streak to 75 years