The story you are about to read is true. Well, mostly true. We think. The names have been changed to protect the innocent. And the guilty.

One of Freed-Hardeman's most popular students in the late 1940s isn't in the yearbook. He wasn't a class clown, per se, but the overwhelming majority of the student body adored him. Girls swooned at the mere mention of his name, hoping he would acknowledge their presence, but he never did. He simply went to chapel, went to class, took his tests and then disappeared for the day.

Since he's not in the yearbook, there isn't much of a description of what he looked like, but we do know he attended class every day. There isn't a record of what he planned to majored in, but he made good grades. Despite his grades and his quiet-but-perfect manners, in the spring in 1948, this ostensible model student was expelled from Freed-Hardeman College.

The final straw for his expulsion occurred on April Fools' Day of 1948. FHC president N.B. Hardeman, who taught spelling at the time in addition to his presidential duties, always read the announcements to the student body at the end of the school's daily chapel service. This student had purportedly lost his spelling book. Hoping someone had found it, he submitted a chapel announcement to Hardeman before chapel requesting it be returned. Unfortunately for this student, the announcement contained four spelling errors that Hardeman didn't discover until he was reading the announcement to the student body. Those four spelling errors proved to be a costly mistake for this student, known only as Ollie Dodd, as they ultimately led to his legendary expulsion.

According to some of our sources, most of whom requested to remain nameless, Ollie Dodd was registered for one Bible class that school year. No one could imagine Ollie Dodd doing anything wrong, so many students were perplexed at the reasoning behind his fateful dismissal from Freed-Hardeman.

"Even though Ollie Dodd attended his classes, took all of the tests with high grades and answered the roll call, he was expelled," explained one of Ollie Dodd's classmates. "The reason, though, was because he was non-existent."

In the Bible class Ollie Dodd registered for, attendance was taken by card, so Ollie Dodd's creators were always sure to fill out an extra card for him, hence his perfect attendance. The final grade for the class was only comprised of a midterm and a final exam, so the two students joined efforts again on test days. One student took Ollie Dodd's midterm and the other took his final. Strangely, according to some sources, Ollie Dodd completed the course with higher grades than either of his masterminded test-takers.

After Ollie Dodd's phony chapel announcement, Brother Hardeman decided to investigate who this bad-spelling student was.

Realizing that there was no documentation of an Ollie Dodd in Freed-Hardeman's records, Hardeman opted to play along by expelling the pseudo student rather than attempting to reprimand the students behind his creation.

"One day in chapel, Brother Hardeman made a very long introduction expressing the great regret of having to expel one of the students. Of course the student body already knew that Ollie Dodd wasn't real, so we were all laughing," recalls another source. "I guess he was expelled for having people take his own tests for him. And for being a bad speller."

Ollie Dodd's legend didn't end at Freed-Hardeman, though. He later "transferred" to Lipscomb University, where it was a full quarter before they discovered that he didn't pay any dues for his classes. Ollie Dodd's story did eventually have to come to an end. Decades after his expulsion from Freed-Hardeman and David Lipscomb, a Freed-Hardeman alumnus discovered Dodd's obituary in an Arkansas newspaper.

Pinpointing Ollie Dodd's past is not an easy task. Some claim he only existed on Freed-Hardeman's campus for a day, while others maintain he was around for a year or more before his expulsion. Perhaps Ollie Dodd's story has turned into one of those big-fish stories over the years, but his tale is one that has served nearly a lifetime of entertainment for the class of 1948. His creators speak very little about him, only recently conceding to being behind Ollie Dodd's existence (or lack thereof) at all. When they do talk about their 60-year-old prank, they're hesitant to relinquish names, determined to keep Ollie Dodd's fabricated lineage under wraps.

Regardless of the time he spent at Freed-Hardeman, Ollie Dodd's legend is forever carved on the campus, though many students and faculty walk over it on a daily basis and never realize it. There is a brick sidewalk laid outside of the Loden-Daniel Library with a name engraved on each brick, serving as a timeless memory or honor of a loved one of the university. There is also one dedicated to Ollie Dodd, undoubtedly purchased by Ollie Dodd's creators, as a tribute to the greatest Freed-Hardeman student to never live.