Academic Plaza - Where Silver Taps Is Held

Photo: Ed Schipul from Houston, TX, US, CC BY-SA 2.0 (cropped)

A stop on Texas A&M Campus Walk, a free self-guided tour.

You are standing in Academic Plaza, the open heart of Texas A&M, shaded by live oaks and facing the green-domed Academic Building. The bronze figure in front of it is Lawrence Sullivan Ross, known to students as Sully. Ross was a Texas Ranger, a Confederate general and a two-term governor before he became president of the college in 1891. Many credit him with saving a struggling school, and after his death in 1898 alumni pushed for this monument by sculptor Pompeo Coppini, dedicated in 1918. His Confederate service and his frontier campaigns have made the statue a subject of public debate in recent years.

This plaza is also where Silver Taps is held, the university's tribute to current students who have died. On the first Tuesday of the month after a student's death, the campus goes dark and quiet, a rifle salute is fired, and buglers play a special version of Taps from the Academic Building. Ross himself was the first person honored this way, in 1898.

Take a moment in the stillness before you move on.

Getting here: The tour begins here, on the lawn of Academic Plaza in front of the Academic Building.

Did you know?: Students leave pennies at Sully's feet for luck before exams, inspired by a campus story that Ross would accept only a penny for tutoring. The coins are collected each semester and given to charity.

Photo op: Step back onto the plaza walk so Sully stands in the foreground with the copper dome rising behind him.

More on Wikipedia: Lawrence Sullivan Ross · Pompeo Coppini · Taps

Academic Plaza - Where Silver Taps Is Held

Stops on this tour