Jennifer Finch held up her hand until the speaker at her graduation got to "four."

Inset of Stella with, from left-to-right, Reni, Susan and Jennifer in December 2004.

That's how many generations of female Texas A&M graduates she represented on the floor of Reed Arena in December 2004. The 22-year-old marketing graduate walked across the stage that day with honors, marking a momentous occasion that saw the first woman in her family cross A&M's graduation stage in 1964.

Generations of men have formed a family bond when their Aggie graduates got together to spin their rings on tabletops, but Finch is considered the first ever fourth-generation Aggie woman.

Tradition dovetailed with her family experience to mean all were encouraged to gain an education through A&M's auspices, with her grandmother and great-grandmother attending classes at A&M before women were allowed to earn degrees from the institution.

"They taught me you can do anything," Jennifer said recently, sharing her pride in her family. "You can be strong and independent and work when opportunity is not in your favor. Whatever it is, I know I can get through it, on my own if I need to."

The story doesn't end there. The fourth-generation Aggie, a former M.B. Zale Leadership Scholar and Retailing Society president, moved to Dallas in January to begin training at Neiman Marcus as an assistant buyer, buried deep in the world of fashion and retail on the strength of her retail studies experience at Mays Business School.

An Aggie story

Susan with seven-year-old Jennifer in her lap looks on with grandmother Reni as great-grandmother Stella holds Jennifer's newborn sister, Erika, in July 1990.

Jennifer's A&M inheritance is rich. Her great-grandfather Lewis Haupt '27 taught electrical engineering to Aggies for 42 years. It was his wife and Jennifer's great-grandmother, Stella Geren Haupt, who became the first woman to enroll for a degree at Texas A&M in 1963.

When Stella applied to enroll, she was 56, a Bryan schoolteacher and the respected wife of a professor — qualities that made her, as Registrar H.L. Heaton acknowledged, a good candidate for integration.

Women were not easily welcomed at A&M. The Student Senate vehemently disapproved of their admittance when it was proposed in the early 1960s, and more than 4,000 students gathered to boo Gen. Earl Rudder after he told them he would not rescind the decision.

In April 1963, reporters and photographers flocked to Stella's sixth-grade classroom, asking her what it meant to be the first Aggie woman. Stella, who died in 1997 at the age of 90, told a Battalion reporter that her grandchildren saw her example on the TV newscast that night.

She simply saw a chance to continue her education and get a master's degree, she told the many reporters she faced that April day. Photos of Stella in cat-eyed glasses grading the work of sixth-graders graced the pages of local and state newspapers.

"I didn't dream I would be the first one," Stella told The Battalion in 1963. "The only reason I am applying now is to get all my past work at A&M straight."

Still, it was a decision that would help Stella and her daughters after her become agents of change just when Texas A&M was poised to begin that change.

Stella and Reni point to the third-generation Aggie woman in their family, Susan, on the day of her graduation on May. 6,1978. The photo appeared the next day in the Bryan-College Station Eagle.

In 1964, Stella graduated with her master's in education. Four years later, her daughter (and Jennifer's grandmother) Arrenia "Reni" Ellis came home to College Station and earned her own master's degree in education.

Reni brought her four children to College Station when her husband, Col. Donald Ellis '54, was deployed to Vietnam. Don is a business graduate who would later inspire granddaughter Jennifer to follow in his educational footsteps.

By the late 1960s, Reni said in a recent interview, women were a more normal sight at Texas A&M. The biggest problem for the fashion-conscious mother — who had graduated from the University of Texas in 1953 with a degree in clothing and design — was making sure her skirts were short enough to blend in on campus.

By the time Reni's daughter, Susan Ellis, opted to attend A&M in the 1970s, the university was facing a new woman-oriented struggle: accepting women in the Corps of Cadets.

It was a struggle that reminded Susan (Jennifer's mother), who graduated in 1978 with a bachelor's in education, of her family tradition at A&M.

"They had to fight," Susan recalled, "just as my grandmother's group had to fight for their place on campus."

The legacy continues

With nearly half the student body at Texas A&M and more than half at Mays now women, Jennifer faced a different world, one 40 years distanced from the struggle that culminated in her great-grandmother's admittance.

Jennifer, who grew up in San Antonio where her mother and grandparents still live, said her time at A&M gave her a closer connection to her grandparents. They'd come to College Station for games and jibe one another about Aggie scores.

More than that, Jennifer said being at the university has helped her understand her family's legacy. And it's helped her realize that she wants to remain close to her roots — both Aggie and family.

"It really brought our family closer," she said. "I'm proud that people in my family were part of the change. It shows that we're definitely a family of strong women who value education." @