This is a guest opinion column

I am a child of Birmingham Southern College. Though I never matriculated as a student on the Hilltop, I was raised by a community of Birmingham Southern College graduates. The lives they lead made an indelible impression on me. They set the examples I aspired to. And as I result, I write with certainty that most of the good fortune in my life is directly attributable to Birmingham Southern College.

My father was born in 1939 at the U.S. Steel Hospital (now known as Lloyd Noland Hospital) in Fairfield. His brother, my uncle, was born there two years later in 1941.

Their father (my grandfather) was an hourly wage worker in the Fairfield Steel Mill. So was his father (my great grandfather). Neither of them had a formal education. Both dropped out of elementary school. They punched a timecard at the dangerous steel mill where many of their co-workers were routinely injured, disabled, and killed. They grew vegetables and raised chickens in their small Ensley yards. This was necessary in order to feed their families when their steel mill wages weren’t enough to buy food.

And my grandfather wanted his sons to have a better life than the one he had.

After my father graduated from Ensley High School, any ideas he had about following his father and grandfather to work in the steel mill were put to rest when my grandfather directed him to enroll at Birmingham Southern College. My uncle graduated from Ensley High School two years later and went as well. And the course of our family’s history was instantly changed for the better.

At Birmingham Southern College my father and his brother received a genuine Liberal Arts education. Science. Math. Art. History. Philosophy. Birmingham Southern College may have only been 3.7 miles from Ensley High School. But it provided its students with intellectual opportunities from throughout the arc of human experience. And it changed them. For the better. And to the benefit of everyone around them.

As a student at Birmingham Southern College my uncle decided to pursue a career in Music. And he did. After graduating from Birmingham Southern College my uncle attended the Manhattan School of Music and was a Music teacher and performer in Atlanta for over 30 years.

My uncle met the love of his life at Birmingham Southern College. They married. Raised a beautiful family. And my Birmingham Southern College graduate aunt was an educator in Atlanta for over 30 years.

One of their Birmingham Southern College classmates was a graduate of Phillips High School (also located a mere 3.7 miles away). He was the Editor of the Hilltop News, member of the basketball and swim teams and President of his Senior Class. He decided he wanted to be an attorney. And he did. He went to Harvard Law School where he was a two-year editor of the Harvard Law Review. And he was a public servant and attorney in Texas for over 40 years.

His graduating class at Harvard Law School is known as “The Class of Birmingham Southern” in part because there were three – 3 !!! – BSC graduates in it.

My father’s Liberal Arts Education at Birmingham Southern College took him in many directions. He ultimately decided on a degree in Accounting. But he also decided to become a lifelong student. And he did. After working a desk job in air conditioning for Southern Natural Gas my father decided to go to law school. He became a tax attorney. And he was an outstanding lawyer and boss for U.S. Steel for over 30 years.

But most importantly to me my father raised me and my sister in a constellation of Birmingham Southern College graduates. We were always around people who read books, wrote letters, spoke thoughtfully, listened attentively, visited museums, attended theater performances and classical music concerts, went to art shows, volunteered to help, shared generously, worked hard and never forgot where they came from.

“The best education I ever received in my life was at Birmingham Southern College.” Each of them said this countless times. (One said it constantly. The guy who went to Harvard.)

I believe them.

And looking at the lives they have lived I agree with them.

These Birmingham Southern College graduates are good people and good citizens. They set good examples for what a good life is and how to live it. They are a credit to their alma mater.

And I am grateful to be a child of Birmingham Southern College.

I may not have attended Birmingham Southern College. But I am certainly a beneficiary of the good it has produced. From my family of origin to the community I grew up in, Birmingham Southern College was ever present. And as a result, I can write with certainty that most of the good fortune in my life is directly attributable to Birmingham Southern College.

George E. Bradford, Jr. was born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1965. He is a Musician, Writer and Ethicist currently living in Atlanta, Georgia. His father is a 1961 graduate of Birmingham Southern College.