Kirk joined The Baylor Lariat on Feb. 1, 1967 — his birthday — just one year before graduating. As The Lariat celebrates its 125th anniversary on Friday, Kirk reminisced on a radically different newsroom, a wooden — military-style structure behind Old Main, perched over Waco Creek.

This Family Weekend, three Baylor families reflected on how The Lariat had shaped not only their college years, but also the careers and callings that followed for their children.

But the building doesn’t seem to share the immortality of its namesake. Thursday afternoon, construction workers stood outside Castellaw to inspect issues on the second floor wall facing Moody Library. According to campus facilities, there are no structural or building issues, and facilities arrived to investigate “exterior ceiling surface deterioration due to weathering over the years.”

Serving as the editor-in-chief of The Lariat has been the greatest privilege of my college career. I never could have imagined how bittersweet it would be to unpin my prints from the board, design my last staff meeting presentation and pass my final story on Camayak. But here I am, shedding a tear or two writing this letter.

Applications to work for The Baylor Lariat next semester are open through April 22, so we thought we’d share some of our favorite parts about being on staff.

Journalism was neither a popular nor healthy career choice in 2014. Despite this, I’ve known journalism was my calling for a few years now. I know that I was born to write for newsprint.