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Chancelor Landrum - Class Of 1965 VIEW PROFILE



 
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11/21/13 07:23 AM #1    

Gail DeRoven (Warren) (1964)

This rememberence is from Edgar Watson....

 

Dear Gail,
 
Thank you for offering to post my memorial comments on Chancellor's page.  Would you post the following thoughts for me?
 
In May of 1968, I met Chancellor while riding the bus to my first day of work at the Ford Rouge Plant.  it turned out that it was his first day there, too.   Although we didn't work in the same building, we became fast friends.  That summer we spent a lot of time together.  Besides riding the bus to and from work together, we partied, played pool, and shared our plans for the future. It's hard to explain why we became so close.  He was a big city boy and I was a slow shy boy from a small town on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan.  Chancellor was not only my friend, he was my mentor as well.  He was a fun loving guy with a keen sense of humor.  He was also kind and sensitive (he didn't want his friends from the hood to know that though).  He took some heat for hanging out with a lame guy like me.  Over that summer, he taught me how to survive and navigate the pitfalls of the big city.  In return, I was able to inspire him to want to go back to school and settle down.  He started going with a young lady named Glarisha.  Chancellor soon bought a car and we started going to MSU on Saturday nights to party with my fraternity brothers and the summer crowd.  We were both sad when the end of the summer came and I had to return to school.  During Christmas vacation that year, I visited my fiancée in Detroit and contacted Chancellor.  It was as if we'd never been apart.  He also informed me that his girlfriend was pregnant and they were seriously thinking about getting married.  Whenever my fiancée came home to Detroit, I would usually come with her and visit Chancellor.  Chancellor's daughter was born during the spring.  He was ecstatic about being a father.  On spring break of that year, I returned to Detroit intending to visit Chancellor, only to discover that he had been gunned down outside of his car. There were no words to describe the loss I felt.  It was as if I'd lost a brother.  I don't know that his murder was ever solved.  I often think of Chancellor and smile and wonder what might have been if he'd have gotten a chance to return to school, marry Glarisha, and raise his daughter.
R.I.P. my friend.
 

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