Mount Penn Lower Alsace Joint High School - Penn Alma Yearbook (Reading, PA)

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' [i.lL'il I I ! I . I, , • OUR OPPORTUNITY SALUTATORY, BY MARGARET H. ELLIS. Fathers, Mothers and Friends: It is vvitli a feeling of deep regret yet with a greater feeling of exultation that I cordially welcome you in behalf of the class of 11122 to our Commencement Exercises. This evening is a milestone in our lives and marks a turning point. Whether it is for the better or not depends on each one of us. Tonight we assume the responsibility of our own actions. We leave behind us the past with its little trials and triumphs, and the place we hold dearest of all. our school and second home. Tomorrow we shall be men and women; tomorrow we shall cease to hear the voices of those who have guided us; tomorrow we shall stand alone. In one of Shakespeare’s plays we find the statement: “There’s a tide in the affairs of men that, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.” This tide we all know is that force which we call Opportunity.” First of all, just what do we mean by opportunity? The dictionary defines it as the fit or convenient time. No better or simpler phrase could be stated. If we mention this we wonder if the fit or convenient time for ourselves has arrived. Now that our school days are practically over, the biggest opportunity that presents itself is the chance to develop ourselves as Good Citizens. This can be done in three ways, which can be grouped as the duty of developing ourselves first, for ourselves. second, for others, and finally for God. In developing ourselves for ourselves we bring out the intellectual or cultural, the physical and the normal sides. Books mean a great deal and play a big part in the intellectual phase. In this our school life has been prominent. Here are grouped together a number of people with different desires and notions but all possessing certain common interests. Here are probably represented different nationalities going through the process of being molded into Americans by common instruction and association. This real idea of democracy that we are trying to realize in our national and local communities. In school we find the necessity for industry and work, for a division of task and for united action. Here it is that more or less responsibility depends on us. And so we see that since school life is a big factor our habits formed here must be those that will work good by being perpetuated in the life of the large community outside of school. The physical phase is one not to be questioned. VVe all can very easily believe that a man of healthy body and mind is always the man desired. His work is beneficial: he cares for community affairs and looks after them as he does his own health. A cheery, sunny disposition always aids and strengthens, and as Browning says, “he is a man who can make life death and that vast forever one grand sweet song.” The moral side has to do, I might say, with each one of us alone. There are times in the lives of all of us when the right and wrong clash and often bring unexpected results. During our schooldays we have often met with such things. VVe know that a man’s beliefs has much to do with his conduct. His religious life has to do not only with God but his attitude toward his fellow-men. And this brings us up to the point when our development as a good citizen shall develop us for others or what I might speak of us as the best thing to live for namely, for others. “To love our neighbors as ourselves,” is the big thing to practice. To take up a phase in life which shall lead us to working for the betterment of the conditions and advancement of others is one which can bring only Mil Twenty-one

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iiiiaiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiiiiwiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii Class Poem We must leave, it’s time for parting, Our triumphant day draws nigh; But with glory we’ll march onward, And we’ll praise you, Mt. Penn High. The good days we’ve spent together, In our joy and happy youth; We shall cherish while we follow Paths of honor and of truth. We have fought and we have conquered, Struggles e’er remain untold; For a future great we’re seeking, Spirited by Brown and Gold. Friends and comrades, we are leaving Comrades, true, in days of yore; But friendship firm will be renewed, When we meet on yonder shore. Adieu to Alma Mater now, The dear school we’ve loved so well; For as the class of twenty-two, We must bid our last “Farewell.”

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!IIIIii9lillllllKIIIHIIillKlllMllllllllllllil the very best results. Each one of us that leaves school tonight, each one who takes as his or her motto “Living to Serve,” are the ones already assured of a successful life. It is the big thing that our teachers have been doing day after day. What we have done is the result of constant stimulation by our teachers. When we faltered they came to our assistance, and with a helping hand urged us on, but from now on their duties cease. They have fulfilled their obligations, and we have henceforth to depend on our own energies. If we have no faith in our abilities and no ambition to unseal them, we are practically useless in this busy world of today. No one can make the future for us. ’Tis true that circumstances govern our actions and mark our time of march, but as soldiers of fortune, as the class which shall be ready to go with the tide Shakespeare assures us shall come, we must be ready to face difficulties and press onward. As when our opportunity comes, when we feel we have developed as a good citizen, not only of our community, city or state but nation as well, may we feel that our schooldays have been worth while, that we have become men and women, true to an honest purpose in life, and by perseverance and singleness of aim win for ourselves a place which can be nothing less than a source of joy to our parents, our teachers and our beloved classmates. iiii'niHniiiitHiiniiniainiiiiiiiiiiuiiiiiiiifliBiiMiMiniiHia SUNRISE, NOT SUNSET VALEDICTORY, BY J. ELMER HUYETT. The world is a series of graduations. In the beginning, we are told, man was little more than the savage animal, living in caves and hollow trees, wearing little clothing, and that but the rudely-tanned skins of beasts, with weapons and utensils—a beast among beasts. Gradually man developed. Some savage discovered that he could chip flakes from a flint stone by striking it with other stones, so as to give it a sharp edge and a convenient shape for the hand to grasp. This invention lifted man into the first stone age. Different tools of stone were manufactured, and among them were flint knives, spearheads. daggers, scrapers and drills. Hut man was still a hunter, with tamed wolves for dogs and reindeer to draw his sleds. The next great step in the advancement of man was from the stone age to the age of metals, about seven thousand years ago. Man made copper implements at first, but consequently found that by mixing tin with the copper, he could equip himself with better implements. The mixture of copper and tin produces bronze, and this age was known as the bronze age. Soon after the age of metals began, man came to use some kind of writing. This invention brings us to the “‘historic'’ period. The earlier “prehistoric” man, with many other gifts, had bequeathed to his successors, and to us, four supreme contributions. First, the use of fire made it possible to advance beyond raw food, and finally beyond stone tools. Second, most of the domestic animals familiar to us in our barnyards were tamed by prehistoric man in the Old World. Third, wheat, barley, rice, and nearly all our other important food grains and garden vegetables were selected from the myriads of wild plants and cultivated and developed Fourth, the invention of writing multiplied lifiliiniliilililiBkllilllWIIIB Twenty-two