Sixty-six years ago this week, a drastic change occurred in my life. At least that’s how it seemed to me then. Over the Christmas holidays in 1950, my family, consisting of myself and two younger sisters, my mother, and my maternal grandparents moved from a farmhouse out in the country into a two story white stucco house in Old Town at the corner of Wood and Apple Streets.
I was seven years old and I didn’t know whether to be scared or excited about changing to a new school.
I had started school in a one room country school in the Washington School District with Ruth Garrett as my teacher. I loved her and also Thelma Prescott who taught second grade.
My grandfather walked with me to that school the first couple of days and then I was left on my own to walk through a wooded area to a gravel road which took me to the school.
The biggest obstacle was getting over the fence that ran between our property and a ditch that bordered a gravel road. My grandfather built a wooden stile with three steps up on our property side and three steps down to the road on the other side. When they were covered in snow I learned to brush the snow off so I could climb them.
Walking to school in town seemed to be so much easier, but in looking back now I think I actually had a longer walk from the farthest end of Wood Street to the Adams School Building than I did on the farm, especially when it included a side trip to the library on Harwood.
I walked into my new school at the Adams Building the first day after Christmas break and saw all the girls lining the long stairway carrying a new doll they had received for Christmas. I didn’t get the email about that so I didn’t know I could bring my doll and I felt out of place.
The boys all brought their shiny new toy guns, by the way.
My mom always fixed my lunch and my memory is that we ate at our desks. I got a new lunch box at the beginning of school and even if I only carried a banana in it once, it would always smell like bananas. Remember?
There wasn’t much variety. My mom loved Vienna sausages (and still does) so I had no choice but to love them too (or go without lunch). But sometimes she would fry a hot dog, or make a fried balony sandwich, or maybe just plain tuna fish. Everybody’s sandwich buns always looked the same in those days whether you had a hot dog or baloney or tuna fish. It was a plain slice of white bread out of the sack from the grocery store, or maybe a cold biscuit split in half. If we didn’t have the usual cookie and banana, we would get those little chocolate cupcakes as a special treat. You know, the ones with white cream in the middle and white squiggles on top of the chocolate icing.
The entire school from first grade to senior high was on that one campus and it was an open campus. We could come and go where and when we pleased without asking permission as long as we got back in time for class. So when my class met in the Washington Building, my mom would give me lunch money and I would cross Washington Street and go to the “Candy Store” and buy a burger or some kind of sandwich with chips.
When we were older, we would go across the street to the Triangle and buy lunch. For less than a quarter, if I remember right, I could get a large sack of greasy homemade fries and a bottle of grape “pop”. Those were the best fries ever and if you offered me some today I would give you a ten dollar bill for three of them. They were that good. I’m sure glad we can’t get them like that today, my cholesterol would go off the chart.
I received an excellent education on that campus and I loved every minute of learning. All the writing skills, spelling, and rules of grammar that many of you compliment me on today were taught in those buildings.
However, my most dreaded class was physical education. The teacher did not like me and the feeling was mutual. That was my only bad teacher experience in all of my 12 years of school. Remember that I walked many blocks to and from school each day. The last thing I needed was more exercise. And if you are a regular reader of my columns you have already picked up on the fact that I dislike sports of any kind. If I have any interest in them at all, it is the most intense form of disinterest. I’m sure that stems from the compulsory attendance and participation in “gym class”.
My purpose in school as I saw it was to read every book I could get my hands on and learn everything possible about every subject imaginable (except sports). So anything that took me away from time spent in reading or studying was wasted time to me. Not only did I enjoy it, but it kept me highly competitive in my grades, so I didn’t need the sports involvement for the thrill of competition either.
I realize this is not normal for most students but it has worked for me all my life. Those habits made me successful in four different careers over my lifetime and I do not yet know the meaning of the word “bored”. (Except in gym class!)
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