Every year on San Jacinto Day Texas Aggies all over the world hold Muster. Muster is roll call for Aggies to answer ‘here’ for Aggies who have passed on in the previous year; currently enrolled students and former students who have graduated. This year would be Bill’s Muster. It was also Lyndee Behrends Wynne’s Muster. Bill was class of ’68; Lyndee was class of ’06.
So Lyndee’s family and I attended the Lubbock A&M Club’s Annual Muster on April 21 at Stone Creek event center in Shallowater.
Muster is a tradition at A&M dating back to 1899, but actually became official during World War II in 1942 when General George F. Moore ’08 had Major Tom Dooley ’35 report the names of twenty-four Aggies who had defended the Pacific Island of Corregidor from the Japanese. Major Dooley said, “So, we had a roll call, and a muster is a roll call.” The event was reported back in the states and became an inspiration for the war weary and solidified the tradition of Muster. On April 21. 1946, Aggies returned to the island of Corregidor because the lost Aggies were present in spirit. Every Aggie who has died the previous year is read somewhere world-wide and on the Aggie campus at College Station.
And today every Aggie will have their name read at an Aggie Muster following their passing. So it was only right that we honor Bill and Lyndee at this Muster.
Muster is a emotional service, but before the actual roll call is also a chance to for Aggies tp get together and share memories of their time at Texas A&M. Which is what we did before and after the muster. Dinner was served and people visited with old friends and met new Aggies. I reconnected with Ted Wilson whom I met at a Plainview muster a few years ago and Jay McKay who had worked with Bill through the Federal Land Bank. This was Donita and family’s first muster. Pictured here are Donita and Earl Behrends; Garrett, the Behrend’s son, and his wife, Amanda; Lyndee’s husband and son, Dustin and Declan Wynne, and Audrey Pleming, Dustin’s daughter.
Musters can be simple get-togethers or more detailed, like this one. But even the simple ones tend to include a reading of “The Muster Tradition,” which tells about the muster on Corregidor Island, “Roll Call for the Absent,” the history of Muster, and then “Softly call the Muster,” which starts the Roll Call.
The lights are dimmed, the white candle is lit, and the roll call is started. As each name is called, someone from the family or a friend answers ‘Here’ and lights a candle for that Aggie, who is there in spirit. Lyndee’s husband and son answered for her, and I answered for Bill. Lyndee’s mom took pictures for us to have that memory.
Photo courtesy of Donita Behrends.
Silver Taps was played after the roll call, followed by a 21 gun salute. “The Last Corps Trip” was read, as it is in most musters, and then we all sang “The Spirit of Aggieland” which is also done at Muster, and then the Muster Chairman sends us off with this benediction:
“The 2025 Texas A&M Muster in Lubbock, Texas, is now complete. I charge each of us to remain firm in our loyalty to God and to country. Keep warm in our hearts, our affections to one another and to our Alma Mater. The Muster s dismissed until April 2026. May God be with us until we meet again.”
And my tears come as we leave.
https://stories.tamu.edu/news/2023/04/20/everything-you-need-to-know-about-aggie-muster/
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