Hats Off! Musings of being a Pirate
November, 2001
By Wyatt Newman
Lest We Forget: The Rogers
Faculty
And here's to those who either guided and taught us or amused and
tormented us: the faculty and staff of John R. Rogers High School. It
seemed, at the time, that many of them were as old as our
grandparents. And here we are...Rogers seniors once again but in a
different and longer context than 1959-60. Review the staff photos in
The Treasure Chest. Why, they look like us! The perspectives change
with age.
We all have memories of individual teachers we spent hours with. But
all of us certainly have a collective memory of the faculty lounge
that was created in the hallway that replaced the former cafeteria.
Remember walking by as a teacher would emerge, and the smoke would
pour out? Remember before the lounge when the smokers, and that seemed
like most of them, took their puffs in the boiler room behind the band
room?
A synopsis of a few of the memorables:
Our principal, Jess Purdy: Seemed to always be in a hurry, entering or
emerging from the main office. Occasionally spoke at assemblies.
Paul MacGowan: For a vice principal, he seemed to enjoy his job and
got along with kids. Always wore tweed jackets and had a crew
cut...style of the era, but usually for us, not "them."
John Jelinek: Always seen in the hallways, seemed friendly, but if he
really wanted to chat with you, you were probably in trouble. Another
one of the crewcuts. Wasn't that a singing group of the time?
Mrs. Pence: The most patient and dedicated teacher of Spanish. Seemed
to really like her calling in life.
Larry Coleman: Was a coach and talked like one...raspy voice. To make
sure you seemed to understand what he had just said, would ask
"Okay?" a lot.
Cecil Johnson: One of the young ones...could even be observed flirting
with young colleagues of the other gender, much to our amusement.
Didn't seem to mind being detected.
E.T. Beecher: Those who had him venerated him. He seemed to be the
dean of the faculty. Offered college level education. Looked like a
prof and even carried a book under his arm, professorlike.
George Molchan and Lena Schmidt, study hall "wardens": Known
simply as "George" he would sometimes be involved in a
physical fracas with a lad who did not take the title
"student" seriously and would burst into some kind of
rebellion...sort of a "I'm mad as hell..." scene. Accounts
of such incidents would fly through the halls.
Mrs. Schmidt could pound a
heavy gavel when she monitored the study hall in the old cafeteria.
Had a voice like a drill sergeant. Would have proctors, older male
students, who were not opposed to grabbing and dragging some hapless
freshman off to another table. She was the hit of the faculty play put
on to raise money to buy Larry Coleman a new car after some student
had torched his while it was in the parking lot. A rather
daring-do...real blackboard jungle stuff did go on at Rogers. But
speaking of "torching," she played the part of a torchy
nightclub singer, eliciting whistles from the male studentry.
Jim Forsythe: Everyone looked forward to his Armistice Day
speech...raised the patriotic blood. Always had a pencil propped in
his ear...sleeves rolled up. Gave frequent quizzes and gave you the
option of "ture or flase," said to have come from former
students who lacked spelling skills, but we now would know were more
likely caused by dyslexia.
J.M Stover: Amusing teacher...great story teller...had samples of advertisements
using psychological appeals, such as the old tobacco ad from the
twenties attempting to lure women into smoking by having a woman say
to a male smoker, "Blow some my way." His class was hard to
get into, many of us wanting to take it simply for the field trip to
Medical Lake and Lakeland Village.
Maude Scofield: Calm, quiet, patient...tried her darnedest to teach us
how to write and do research.
Theodora Frisbie: Well-known to weep every time she showed "The
Yearling" to her classes. As regular an event as macaroni and
cheese in the cafeteria on Fridays. Most interesting name when you
look at it now.
Harold Thompson: A little bit of math here...lots of politics and
basketball there.
Laverne Mabbott: Along with Jim Forsythe, provided us with Friday
movies, those crusty black and white educational films which we
couldn't really watch because we had to take notes. Two classes of
kids in one classroom...cheek-to-cheek. Beat the daily lectures,
though.
Tracy Walters: "Pardon my French," common phrase used when
addressing track team. Always spoke in a loud, earnest voice...seemed
like preparing troops for battle. Most memorable statement was
motivating speech to "Beat those South Hill bums," when
twenty-four hours from doing battle on the track with the Tigers of
Lewis and Clark.
Lewis Sabo: Did anyone get through Rogers without his biology lessons?
If you didn't pay attention, a chalkboard eraser was heading your way.
Had a great aim; never missed. Frog dissecting was the most
anticipated/foreboding class project. Teacher who had the first field
trip to some real field to capture grasshoppers for later study. Oh,
the joy!
Harry "Merry" Merrick: Mr. Nice guy. Along with Francis
Carroll who always seemed willing to chaperone. Both seemed to really
like us. Two science teachers with a lot of humanity.
Milton Stumpf: The typing teacher. Remember the monotones as we
learned the keyboard: "j-y-j. f-t-f." On and on. Had to be
the most boring subject to teach in all Rogersdom. Painful to witness
and experience, but we knew the essentials of learning to type...next
to learning to drive, what else could be so important?
Robert "Bob" Foster: Perpetual five-o'clock shadow...bulldog
intensity...one of the heavy smokers. Blue cloud seemed to follow him.
Carl "Toughy" Ellingson: Pretty good at tossing the ball out
of the high window into the gym. Believed in wheat germ as key to
athletic success...sold it on the side to those of us who had
visions of championships.
Somewhere, there was a little bit of Miss Brooks, Mr. Boynton and
Osgood Conklin in our staff...the sympathetic, the studious and the
strict. Maybe we got ourselves through school. Maybe they led us
through. Some are an important part of our memories...others are
hardly recognizable when reviewing the Treasure Chest. Most are
probably no longer around. But wouldn't it be an added attraction to
see some of them again, say, in 2010?
We'll be 68, and they might be....hmmm.
-Wyatt
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