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It was in the fall of 1926 that I started school. My parents had thought of starting me in the fall of 1925 but decided to wait one more year. There was a great deal of ceremony attached to this event. There was little that I knew about this famous crossroads of life. There was considerable talk about spankings for inappropriate behaviors the word naughty was used but that didn't explain very much either. I couldn't quite figure out what went on in school.
The process began when we drove to Jamestown and proceeded to the J.C. Penney store that stood on the corner of Main and First of the biggest city I had ever seen. This was huge building, a magnificent enterprise with all kinds of clothing. Above the store were the offices of Drs. Dupuy and Sorkness. We became acquainted with them later in life.
We presented ourselves in the sartorial department of the J.C. Penney store. Appropriate purchases were made for proper school apparel. My memory tells me that almost all items were purchased at the J.C. Penny store. It was a place with many new inventions. The store had little cars that ran on wire to a desk on a balcony. It was fascinating to watch the clerk put money in the little cup pull a rope and "action" away that cup sped to a desk on a balcony and came back with proper change, I presume. The preparation for the beginning school event was interesting. Why should anyone have to dress in short pants in order to enter a place where there was a high degree of punishment?
So after the trip to J.C. Penney, thoroughly warned about something called deportment, my parents took me to Montpelier and enrolled me in school. It was September 1926. It was something to look forward to but with fear and anxiety but determination to face the unknown.
I was firmly determined to do as my parents directed, as the teacher asked, and probably afraid that not doing so would end in a spanking. My impression now in 2001, is that spanking in school was very much on the minds of the adult generation of that time. It was to be my discovery that the school had other methods of administering punishment and achieving correction.
My idea about school was limited but I was impressed with clothing requirements. The importance of going to school was emphasized by the attention my parents focused on it. I knew that something was expected of me. I was expected to be a good boy--and obey the teacher. There was admonishment about punishment being attached to certain behavior in school. It was also emphasized there would also be punishment on return home. I was not certain what those behaviors were but I knew that I did not want to engage in them or get punished. It was that very desire that was to get me into trouble. Of all those things I wasn't supposed to do, the only one I really understood was about the words I wasn't supposed to use. After sufficient warning about mouths washed with soap and other things we did watch ourselves regarding language on the school grounds. Such language was strictly forbidden and punishment was sometimes administered. It is strange the strength and power of prohibition issued by teachers, parents and school rules. Once in a while someone would forget and have a slip of the tongue the result being that another child always heard and went tattling to the teacher. We also knew this was a boy problem, girls weren't supposed to know those words. So we learned to be on guard, trust no one, and be careful in regard to language usage. After all one doesn't want to embarrass one's parents either.
My father had great curiosity about school and what occurred in those hallowed precincts. He was also concerned about how I was doing. Each evening for the longest time I was asked if I had learned to read today. This was a behavior that one was obviously expected to learn or so it seemed to me and I hadn't. For a very long time I had to answer "no." We were playing around with something called phonics, making speech sounds of an appropriate nature and associating them with various combinations of signs on cards the teacher would flip over quickly. So I couldn't take home the good news that I was learning to read, I didn't know what I was learning. I kept feeling more and more discouraged with being unable to accomplish what was clearly expected of me. There will be more on this reading thing a little later in the chapter.
Then my father asked me what person I liked best in the classroom and I innocently answered "Mildred" which was the truth. As a result I got teased for liking a very nice and beautiful girl. Mildred was a person I secretly admired while in grade school and for one year of high school. She was a gentle, kind person all the years I knew her. She was also the closest academic challenger through my grade school years. I have never appreciated the teasing about this very wonderful girl.
My father also asked me about my behavior and the behavior of other children in the class. So being of a creative bent I began to make up stories about the behavior of some of my classmates. I do not now remember what those stories were, I neglected to write them down. However, I believe they became more lurid and horrific as my imagination worked on them. My father seemed to take greater interest in them, the more imaginative they became...until. I was doing pretty well with my story telling. Then one day the teacher confronted me with some of the stories that centered around a couple of other rather docile pupils in the class. My father had gone to town, talked about the trouble the teacher was having with a couple of students and that was overheard and transmitted to a member of the school board, who transmitted it to the teacher who took trouble to make inquiries of myself. Miss Patterson was a very good teacher and she made judicious inquiry regarding what I had told my father. It was quite a few years later I understood this must also have put some pressure on the teacher since continued employment in those days very much depended upon ability to maintain discipline. I admitted to her that none of it was true and she required me to apologize to the class and particularly to the two young men whose behavior had been conjured far beyond anything they had actually done. I think my father was disappointed that I suddenly stopped telling stories. It may be that someone, the teacher, or other informed him what had happened. I didn't tell him. Anyway eventually he quit asking and I never had to face that kind of embarrassing situation again.
In the 1920's and 1930's there must have existed in the minds of our parents and other adults a rather punitive attitude in regard to controlling behavior of children. I have wondered if that was the school experience of their generation. I think threats were frequently used induce correct behavior and conduct in children. Physical punishment was not unknown. Slapping of hands and rapping knuckles were more frequent in my experience than a spanking applied to one's backside. A review of those times makes it obvious that we engaged in activities that neither teachers nor our parents would have approved.
There are some things that aroused strong reactions on the part of teachers and ultimately made them early law enforcers in our young lives. A group of us 2nd and 3rd grade boys discovered that an old horse drawn school bus hidden behind a building on the school ground was a good place to practice smoking. It was our experimental laboratory as well as an extra-curricular activity. It was easy to pilfer our fathers' Velvet, Edgeworth, Union Leader and Prince Albert tobacco cans for the necessary ingredient, cigarette papers acquired as easily, usually in the same act of misappropriation. I know that most of us were forbidden to carry matches for various reasons, but that was no deterrent to a few brave souls bent on a more complete education. It is strange that none of us became ill. I recognize now that we must have carried the odor of tobacco on our return to the classroom and this must have aroused suspicion. About the third or fourth day of our noon practice session the rear door of the old school bus suddenly opened and there stood the principal with a very grim look on his face. Our noon recess was quickly terminated and we were returned to the jurisdiction of our teacher. In our case each one of us was taken alone into the cloakroom in which she made an investigative inquiry, scolded us and admonished us to tell our parents what we had been up to. Well, I never told my parents, but some one did. Anyway as a result of the discovery of our forbidden acts of disobedience, theft, and other crime, I refrained from the use of tobacco for quite a few years.
One disciplinary episode still leaves me wondering, it occurred when I was in the third grade. The teacher had assigned me to the very front seat in the row, probably for good reason. The desks were screwed to the floor so they could not move around. One day Joseph who had been assigned to the last seat in the rear of the row decided to go crawling on his hands and knees up and down the aisle. The teacher was engaged with a group of first grade pupils on the other side of the room. Joseph made several trips up and down the aisle making a nuisance of himself. The journey that turned out to be the last one was when I reached down and pulled his hair as he went by my desk. This caused a loud yell of pain which immediately caught the teacher's attention. The teacher came over and gave me a sound scolding, never said a word to Joseph and I had never left my seat! I always suspected she thought I was capable of it.
It was only once that I can recall physical corporal backside punishment used by a teacher. It was applied to the backsides of two boys who tangled in a vicious fisticuffs on the school ground. In this case the teacher used his belt as the instrument of punishment for both boys.
My own career as a school ground pugilist was not extensive. The first incident occurred in the third grade when a classmate and I found ourselves surrounded by some upper grade and high school students. We were subjected to some name calling, urging, prodding, and other persuasive methods to engage each other in battle. It was one of those "you and him" fight situations. There was no way out of the engagement and neither of us relished the occasion. After taunting, daring and persuasion and no way out we tangled. It ended just as quickly as it had started. In my reluctant enthusiasm for the encounter I went into battle with my tongue sticking out and on immediately receiving a blow on the chin I bit my tongue. As I spit out blood the group of boys surrounding us quickly disappeared leaving us two combatants to console one another. Apparently no one tattled. I hid my agony the rest of the school day. My mother was concerned about my bitten tongue. My parents felt that was punishment enough for fighting and dropped the matter.
There was no punishment in my second school ground fight which occurred the spring of 1933. I was in the seventh grade. I caught two other seventh grade boys holding down pupils from the 1 st, 2nd and 3rd grade. The two boys each had cloth caps and had filled them with dirt and sand. They were holding down younger students and pounding them in the face with their sand filled caps. I became extremely angry when I saw this and grabbed their caps and hurled them as far as I could. Since they were filled with sand they went pretty far. One boy backed off as he was smaller than I, the other began pounding and beating me and I fought back. He pounded me on the arm since he had hold of it but it left me free to aim at more vulnerable features that left a cut on his face. I felt he would beat and hurt me since he was bigger but I was not about to quit. A group of eighth grade girls came around the comer of the building as we were getting serious and I heard a shout, "Let's help Billy Cofell," and they pulled us apart. The other young man as we were disengaged by the girls said "I'll see you after school behind the barn." I was still angry and decided to give him the chance. After school, I walked very slowly to the barn but he never followed. I had the teacher who had spanked the two boys for fighting and I was worried that he would find out. Someone did tell the teacher about the incident on the school ground because the teacher... told my father. The teacher said he was ready and had watched from the school window to see if the other boy would really follow me. I have never lost my abhorrence of any kind of bullying or coercive behavior whether verbal or physical.
In my opinion verbal and physical abuse of one child by another is not behavior that contributes to the positive growth of the victim or the abuser in or out of school. Both are victims of an abusive environment that teachers can and should control. The difficulty is that it takes attention to what is happening in a classroom and on the school ground, and today, in and on the school. bus. I believe some abuse continues simply because it is tolerated. My involvement with that other seventh grade boy inhibited his future behavior on the school ground. The teacher who listens to or witnesses an episode lets every student know something about the limits of behavior. They let the student know whether they are protected or not. The teacher likewise must set the example by avoiding sarcasm, verbal "put-downs", and unreasonable and punitive rules. If they can they should also help the abuser gain a different attitude about self and his or her behavior. In a world with so much abuse, hostility, and contempt adults must help children grow with positive regard and respect for themselves and others.
The preceding long digression diverts the story from the first day of school which must have been traumatic for some fellow scholars. There were a couple who cried---which at that time in my critical estimation and judgment was unethical behavior for boys. The teacher also spoke about toilet permission and that we should raise our hands and things of that kind. Since I thought this would be a good thing to know about, I raised my hand and was shown to the place of thrones by a third grade student.
During the first day we were organized, given rules and a number of things necessary for the conduct of school beginning. There were three grades in our room and probably about thirty pupils. I spent three years in that room and became well acquainted with all aspects of it. Miss Dazey Patterson from Frazee, Minnesota was my teacher in the first and second grade. As I look back at a long educational career there is no doubt that Miss Patterson was the most important of all the fine teachers I have encountered. Somehow, along with my parents, she stirred the interest in scholarly pursuits. All accounts from others that I have heard are all praiseworthy in regard to her skill as a teacher.
The first day of school the boy in front of me cried because he wasn't given a book. I would have been ashamed to cry so strong was the injunction against boys crying in public. He started crying when books were handed out to the second and third grade students.
There were at least eleven first graders. George Hunt, Billy Cofell, Paul Sevik, Mildred Gullickson, Gerald Gullickson, Joseph Seiler, Juanita Moore, Kenneth Gehlhar, Joan Cumber, Frank Finnegan and Buelah Iverson. There may have been a couple of others that I do not remember. It is with this little community of aspiring scholars that I began my educational adventure, which is what it became.
Even during those first days of school, on arriving home I was asked if I had learned to read. Responding required the admission that I hadn't. The question was asked many many days after that and each time left a feeling that I was a disappointment to my parents.
Actually it took me some time to learn to read. We began with the phonetic method of reading and it is a slow process. All the debate that has gone on regarding the best method of teaching reading or learning to read is in fact largely a matter of adult opinion. Certainly the school had a lot to do with learning to read. We had a good teacher who certainly laid a foundation but the person who really taught me to read was my mother. It was not easy for a farm wife and mother to help her children with school tasks in the evening. Each evening for a little while my mother would sit with me and listen to the lesson. I can remember crying and wanting to give up but she insisted and I persisted. The method mother used comes closest to what we call word recognition. The actual self realization that I was a reader came one day when I was in the third grade. I have a vivid memory of it. I picked up a copy of the news magazine "Grit" and began a game of underlining the words I knew and--- suddenly realized that all the words were being underlined and that I understood almost everything on that page. My eyes flew over the page and the story came into my mind and since then, I have read with avid interest almost everything laying about and ready to be read.
One of our neighbors was employed by the school board to run the school bus. He was at the beginning and end of the line. The bus was his private car which was either an Overland or a Star. It was our conveyance to school for four years. He transported the children of seven or eight families I'm not certain of the number of children. My guess would be about nine or ten. Some smaller children had to sit on the laps of older children and along with school books and lunch buckets we made the five to eight mile route twice a day to and from the school in Montpelier. The building was one that was built in 1914 so when we started it was still quite new but we did not realize that. It is still standing today (2001) but I do not know whether that part is still used or not.
The bus transportation was an arrangement that would not be permitted today. We did not always ride in an automobile. During winter the transportation was often provided by a team of horses pulling a bob sled. A wagon box was placed on the runners and covered with canvas. There was hay on the floor and there were charcoal heaters to keep the children's feet from freezing. In spring during the muddy period a wagon or buggy was used to transport us. As soon as the roads dried out the automobile again became the mode of transportation. In winter the bus came much earlier for us because we were near the end of the route, perhaps a mile from the neighbor providing transport. In the winter it was dark when we started and it was dark when we arrived home. I remember that when we arrived home that mother would already have supper on the table.
We had only one time that we did not make it home. It was when I was in the fourth grade. This year (it was either the winter of 1929-30 or 1930-31) we had a different bus driver who lived about half way between our place and school, about three miles from town. He had to let his brother off the bus, but when we got to his place the snow and wind had become so bad that he decided not to go on. This was the Seiler place and it was located along the Beaver Creek among trees in a sheltered valley. The Seilers had a telephone and they called our place and a couple of other places on the line letting our parents know where we were. Those who did not have telephones did not find out until a couple of days later. As I remember we stayed the next day because the storm continued. Mrs. Seiler packed lunches for all the children and we went to school after the storm let up. A few years later we stayed in town during a storm when Lois and I were in High School but that is in another Chapter.