During his valedictorian speech at Hampden-Sydney College last week, Robert Brandon Stultz was discussing Socrates' observation that an unexamined life is not worth living and how we should look outside ourselves for what we need -- when he went off script.

The 22-year-old physics major extemporaneously segued into how love is the most important thing mankind has and how he had fallen in love. He then proposed to his girlfriend, Christa Anne Leotti, who was in the audience. She accepted.

"We were showered with congratulations," Stultz said later.

School officials had seen a draft of Stultz's speech, which he only had two days to write, and because he wanted the proposal to be a surprise, "I ended up sort of improvising."

Earl W. Fleck, the school's provost and dean of the faculty, said he has been at H-SC for six years and at other liberal arts colleges for 29 years and this was the first proposal he's heard from the dais.

"When I realized what he was doing, I was fervently hoping that his intended would say yes," Fleck said. "How embarrassing if she said no."

There wasn't much chance of that, Stultz said. The two have been dating for a little over a year and they had already discussed marriage and he had already informally proposed.

They want to marry next summer.

Stultz will spend the summer working in Chattanooga, Tenn., and plans to pursue his masters and a doctorate in physics. Leotti, 20, of Lynchburg, has two more years at Baylor University, and plans to go to medical school.

The proposal created a stir on campus.

"I couldn't walk anywhere without someone congratulating me," Stultz said. "It really was a special day."
Contact Jamie Ruff at (434) 392-6605 or jruff@timesdispatch.com.