"There’s this feeling that rolls up from your gut to your heart and you realize it’s patriotism."

That’s how Mary Lou Wilmore described watching the graduation and swearing in of the U.S. Military Academy Class of 2001 in Michie Stadium here.

"It’s a tremendous moment," said Wilmore, whose granddaughter, 2nd Lt. Meghan Wilmore, is one of the 901 graduates who went from "cadet gray to Army blue," as USMA Superintendent Lt. Gen. Daniel W. Christman put it at Saturday’s ceremony.

That ceremony started out wet.

The newest members of the long, gray line marched in wearing their cadet gray, including rain gear, for the last time.

"It was kind of fitting that it was raining," said newly commissioned 2nd Lt. Ted Ruzicka. "Everybody knows we’ve been rained on a lot."

By the time their second lieutenants’ bars were shining against the green of their Class A uniforms, the sun was shining in the afternoon sky. That offered a fitting backdrop to the shining faces of the graduates whose emotions filled Michie Stadium.

Among those emotions were pride, excitement, satisfaction and some trepidation.

2nd Lt. Terrance R. Houston, a newly commissioned field artillery officer from Atlanta, said satisfaction is what he felt as he entered the stadium. He admitted to a little apprehension as he walked out of the stadium and into the next phase of his Army career.

But his mother, Kathy Oliver, said all she could feel was pride, not just for her son but for all in the Class of 2001.