Sandra O’Connor remembers everything about the night President Bill Clinton spoke at the Guilford College Bryan Series – Nov. 30, 2010, to be exact – in the first series program held in the main arena of the Greensboro Coliseum. She remembers the excitement, the anticipation, the buzz – even the size of the crowd.

One.

“I mean, I knew there were 3,000 people there with me, but I still feel like he was talking to me and only me,” says Sandra, a longtime Bryan Series Legacy Society Member. “It’s been such a life-changing event for me and for a lot of other people, too.”

Tuesday’s Bryan Series featuring actor and activist Ashley Judd tugged on a range of emotions from Sandra and other loyal series members who learned last month that, after 20 years, the curtain was coming down on the longest-running subscription lecture series in the region (before 2005, programs were presented free on campus).

Since 1996, the Bryan Series has brought some of the biggest names and thought leaders to Greensboro. People like Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, authors Toni Morrison and Salman Rushdie, musician Yo-Yo Ma, actors Steve Martin and Sidney Poitier, and media figures Bill Moyers and Judy Woodruff.

Every attendee at Tuesday’s finale had a personal favorite. Sandra was supposed to hear journalist and foreign policy analyst Fareed Zakaria close out the 2011-12 season with a group of three friends. When all three backed out, she went by herself.

“I swear that entire season (that included British Prime Minister Tony Blair and documentary filmmaker Ken Burns) was worth that one ticket,” said Sandra. “He was just a fabulous teacher.”

Why is it you always feel like laughing and crying when staring at the end of something? Why can't a good thing go on forever?

Dawn Chaney says the Bryan Series “brought people to Greensboro that we would never have had the opportunity to hear and see.”

“It was wonderful because we got to sit and be entertained, sure, but we also got to listen to their side of a story and we learned,” she says. “I think that’s critical now more than ever, right?”

Tamara Slaughter ‘85 and her husband Jim were Legacy Society members for years. She says the lectures felt more like conversations. “The series was like a window on the world for me,” she says. “To come here and see and hear from leaders of the world talk about politics and medicine and science and theater was priceless. Seriously, how do you put a price on something like this?”

Unfortunately, the College had to put a price on it. The number of subscribers and Legacy Society members steadily declined after COVID, as competition for peoples’ attention increased with hundreds of programs annually at the new Tanger Center. As part of efforts to stabilize College finances, Guilford leadership made the decision earlier this year to discontinue the series.

“I understand the reason behind it,” says Tamara, but that doesn’t make it easier. Hearing from such a diverse group of speakers was only half the joy. Sharing those nights with other Legacy members made it all the better.”

She was surrounded by other Legacy Society members at Tuesday night’s pre-event reception. “Somebody called the Legacy Members my posse, and I thought that was a perfect description. These people, they’re my group. I’m going to miss seeing my peeps.”