NASSAU CELEBRATION FOUNDERS’ DAY 17TH BIENNIAL NATIONAL THE BAHAMAS JANUARY 7-11, 2026
NATIONAL FOUNDERS’ DAY THE BAHAMAS
Left: The 78th Laurel Wreath Laureate Rev. Dr. Howard-John Wesley (Iota Xi 1991) opens the 17th Biennial National Founder’s Day events with a prayer. Right: he delegates’ rapt attention was unmistakable..
“WE ARE NOT COMPETING AGAINST EACH OTHER. WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO PUT OTHER BROTHERS INTO PLACES WHERE THEY KNOW THEY NEED TO BE?” - Leslie C. Smith, 84th Laurel Wreath Laureate
The large screen behind him dis- played a photograph from another life: a younger Via, who was a one-star brig- adier general in Mannheim, Germany, in 2006, addressing troops about to deploy to Iraq. “They aren’t going out on a field and playing for a couple of hours and then going home,” he said, voice softening. “They’re leaving their homes for 12, maybe 15 months.” Brother Via counseled them to “trust your leadership, trust your train- ing, trust your equipment, trust your instincts,” which had become his coun- sel to the room full of Kappa men. The stakes were different, but the demand was the same: show up prepared, show up humble, show up mission ready. If Brother Via’s message was about the sacredness of the moment, Lieu- tenant General Leslie C. Smith’s (Iota Pi 1982) was about what you did with it once it arrived. Smith, a three-star
general, Kappa’s first Army Inspector General and 84th Laurel Wreath Lau- reate, refused to let the audience hide in the dark anonymity of a ballroom. He broke the room into more than twenty clusters—Group 1, Group 2, Group 3—a human grid of inspired gazes and crossed arms. “How many of you have had a good leader?” Hands shot up. “Bad leaders?”
Almost as many hands. At each micro- phone, a different story: a polemarch from Columbus lamenting supervisors who led by rumor; an undergraduate explaining that his chapter’s purpose in Kappa was “expansion”—bringing in men from different walks of life and perspectives. “You have to understand that we are all in this together,” Brother Smith said. “Leadership matters.”
38 THE JOURNAL ♦ WINTER 2025-2026
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