Chester High School - Flamstead Challenge Yearbook (Chester, VT)

Page 25 text:

FLAMSTEAD CHALLENGE this haze, as it were, descends like fog until even the hills surrounding the village are barely visible. Now, small, white flakes of snow are seen drifting lazily down from the gray sky. You pull up your collar and start for home. As you near your destination, the air is a whirling mass of snow. The ground is white and each footmark is obliterated by a soft carpet almost as soon as made. This scene was in America, where the soil has not been disturbed and ruined by bombs and artillery shells, where children play without fear of enemy planes overheadg the America of freedom and libertyfloving people. Freedomfloving, we say. Freedom for just ourselves or for every person, no matter what may be his race, creed or color? In France, with our Armed Forces, Thanksgiving was just another day. The snow was deep on the battlefiield and was crissfcrossed with the ruts and tracks of trucks and tanks. There should have been another set of tracks there, the tracks of an ambulance. But there was not. Someone forgot! Perhaps they did not buy that extra war bond, or perhaps they did not give their share to the Red Cross campaign, because they had to go to the movies twice a week. Was that person you? The snow on the fields was, in some places, soaked with scarlet, human blood. Someone back home forgot! Perhaps they were in such a hurry to get to the Spring Style Show that they did not take time to drain the grease from that frying pan.. If they had, that soldier might have had that extra bullet to stop the enemy before he- well, you know. Was that person you? A Belgian peasant and his family were slaughtered by the enemy before our troops could move ahead. The army couldn't make that offensive they had planned because they were short of shells and gasoline. Again someone in America forgot! Someone was so interested in his own welfare that he joined the strike for higher wages down at the munitions plant when he was already earning more than was necessary to support himself. Someone else applied for extra gasoline to visit a sick friend . When they got it they went to the lake on a fishing trip. Was that person you? The boys at the front had no place to go for relaxation behind the lines. Some' one back home did not give to the War Chest Drive, because they had to have a new fur coat, the one they bought last year being out of style. Was that person you? Let us go back to that small town in New England. In the morning the ground was covered with a thick blanket of crystalfwhite snow. Even the poorest twig on the elm tree was ridged inchfdeep with pearl . It was a peaceful and joyous moming. It was,-until a certain telegram came to one of the families of the town. It was one of those telegrams that read thus: The War Department regrets to inform you that your son--etc. The town was shocked. Miss Van Guilder expressed her sympathy to the mother. Did she ever think that she and her club might have been indirectly responsible for this mother's grief? They should have been at the hospital as nurses' aides, or at the Red Cross Sewing Center working for a good cause. They and many other Amerif cans could have done something, but they did not. Can some of us, then, truly call ourselves Americans? The answer is no , not until peace, freedom, safety, justice, and all the other fundamentals of our democratic government have been brought to every person in the world. When this has been ac' complishd we may truly and proudly say, I have done my part. I am an American. -Ray Lawrence

Page 27 text:

PIFACE qi if x 4'i?4Q Q41 Samoa HOROSCOPE Qyf Y