South High School - Southernaire Yearbook (Cleveland, OH)

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Mad Memoirs Miss Weiss knew how to handle problems' when she stuffed Joan Kohouc behind the piano. Betty Ann Chuha knew how to handle wild ones, too; she tamed a Savage (Don). I see, I sec, replied the Doctor, is that what led you to biting your toenails? Oh! my no. I formed that habit when Florence Balcer and Delores Wilson started coming to school with two different kinds of sox; followed by Halina Wiklinski and Roberta Richards clopping around with two different kinds of shoes on, and when Shirley Ann Kestranck, Pat Cook, and Henrietta Jarosz used to run around falling up the stairs instead of down them; those girls really put their best foot foward — so did Mr. Barnes, but it landed in a paint bucket left on the stage by Charles Vondrasck. Gadzooks! 1 wouldn’t have taught dramatics for anything, especially with Larry Jajcinovic making like Goldilocks and causing Arlowene Bennett, Lucille Bisesi, Donna Simek, Marilyn Uhler, Bob Primer, to get short attacks of Oops -1 - forgot my - lines plague. And who can blame someone for locking Virginia Piwinski in the light gallery. It's those little things that make us teachers into crazy mixed-up-little cases. Pssstrr! Confidentially, I think Melda Brewer needs help too, Doc. Because one day she thought she was a moving van hired to move the books in the library from the shelves to the floor. Jeanette Piontkowski is another one; she walked into class ten minutes late, then found out she was in the wrong class. I thought the same of Marion Pinter when she mistook Mr. Sutter for Mr. W. O. Smith until I found out she had a splotch of ink on her glasses. That reminds me. I'll have to get myself a pair of glasses because 1 hear it's nor nice to hit anyone wearing them. Not that I'm a coward, but when Georgiana Zak signaled left — then turned right, or when Gerry Raczynski laughed with a sinister gleam in her eye, Hooray!!! I got my license — look out pedestrians!!' Ir wasn't safe anywhere with Carole Daw-son. Jean Michalak, Joyce Gillespie, Irene Kata, Sally Huxtable, Carolyn Lucas, and Phyllis Tat-ulinski chasing their intended victims down the sidewalks with the drivers training car. It seems to me that cars ought to be equipped w-ith conveniences like built in mud puddles so that Joni James and Phyllis Hanshaw wouldn't have to go through the trouble of falling out of cars to fall into them. Marge Angyal felt that milk was healthier than mud to splash on herself but Bill Bodnovich preferred acid because he said it made his pants look so 'holy.' And then again Marianne Smey drank her acid — I guess it’s all a matter of taste. Speaking of rastc, Pauline Gurtatowski got three gray hairs wondering whether a well bred young lady sloshes the sugar or the cream into her coffee first. . . . Please, Doctor! Put that cigarette away. I can't stand the smell of cigarette smoke ever since Don Chojnacki taught the skeleton in Miss Kcmp-ski's room to smoke, and I grew to hate cigars, too, since Frank Chilinski took to smoking them on school property. I've also developed a phobia toward liquids ever since Lowell Culbertson, Charles Armour, and Dave Fisher started taking their gym showers during air raid drills. Oh, those gym classes of Mr. Thompson’s were the craziest with kids like Joe Picciano, Richard Venesky. Ray Kaczyinski, Thomas Murray, Dave Stoctzner and Lcn Koprowski making like something from the jungles of the Amazon. Its a wonder Bob Brown, Walter Szczcsny, and Jim Zehnal were able to get any basketball playing done. The girls' gym class wasn't any better because Pat Wasiniak couldn't tell the difference between the boys’ and the girls' locker rooms. Of course Bev Dlugo, Margie Bartholomew, Carrie Pappas, and June Smola laughed their heads off — but then, those kids were always laughing at the wrong time. Take the time George Munster, Don Schroedcr, Ray Mack, and Richard Jaklic were nearly rolling in the aisles because certain boys were having trouble keeping on the up and up with wearing apparel. Lil Niznick, Rileen Kalasinski, and Margaret Gizzi fought tooth and nail to keep their clothes together. Even Dick Pazdcrski's white bucks embarrased him in front of people. Of course, Walter Volinski and Lynell Middleton were no help when it came to comforting embarrassed people—they only stopped laughing long enough to wipe away the tears. Talk about odd senses 24

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Mad Memoirs Cautiously, the door of the psychiatrist's office was poked open. S-chh, chh, chh! O-chh, chh. chh! U-cch, cch! T-chh, chh, chh! H-chh, chh, chh! Peek-a-boo! Recognizing the shuffle almost immediately as that of a high school teacher, the doctor hastened to assist the prospective patient. One could easily detect that he had an advanced case of Southern Shakes as he wobbled hesitantly, then slouched on the couch. Tell me,” cried the doctor as he grabbed for his pad and Neversharp pencil, what factors led you to this nervous condition? Through a blur of tears the tuckered tutor replied, Doctor, you would never believe it, but I was a normal teacher at South High School up until the September of 1951. Then came a gabby bunch. Mary Jane Houston jabbered so much once that she lost her voice; but Virginia Olbrys was made of sterner stuff and had to be excused from American History class for talking too much. You’d never think that with all the practice Arlene Nightingale had in chewing the rag, she'd fluff when she talked on a mike in the radio room; or that Pat Walkowiak would forget her first public speech on stage. Hah! I still remember how Rose Marie Skuta went around talking ro the-littlc-man-that-wasn’t-therc; but Jean Wasnicwski liked sighing loudly in English class until she was reprimanded for her blunder As if all this yakity-yak wasn't enough, we had to teach kids with names like Rita Szarafinski. Ix r-etta Szymankiewicz and Sandra Strzalkowska or however you pronounce them. Miss D. Gallagher remedied that, though, by calling Mary Lou Gorski. Emo-gene. She also was on the lookout for kids like Gene Glasko who preferred picking up eyefulls of pretty girls in class instead of paper from the floor. And eating! . . . Why there were: Eleanor Ciurlik. Millie Ujcic, Elsie Ferenc, Shirley Bolser. Marie Ban-eckoff, Pat Bcnkowski, Roberta Pokorny, and Cecelia Santin, who went around eating up all of Miss Cary’s radishes then left pennies to pay for them. I even caught Charlotte Rogaski eating in honor study hall. If you think I’m exaggerating about those South High appetites. Doc, Mr. Katz will tell you about the time he caught Janice Jasky with a banana in her French horn. But did all this eating between meals bother their appetites at lunch time? I should say not! No, no no! Emphatically No!—S-chh, chh, chh! O-chh, chh . . . Easy there now, my good fellow. Control yourself and tell me more, said the psychiatrist soothingly. Mar)’ Ann Stepka at least had the consideration to eat lunch in the cafeteria . . . even though she was half through gobbling up the wrong lunch before she realized it. And how Rose Rychlinski cried when she opened her lunch bag and found it full of onions by mistake. Bur those girls who insisted on carting their lunches away unnerved me so. Ann Stokar, for instance, didn't want to get fat by eating cookies so she used to exercise them by taking them for long walks in the halls . . . until Mr. Bopp decided that the cookies were thin enough. Of course, I'll have to admit it was hard enough to get used to empty milk bottles in Angela Sokolowski's purse, but those pickled grasshoppers and spiders in Delores Bright's still make me wonder about the stomachs of the younger generation The 74th Street derelict began to sob abrupty as he confided that he hadn't even been invited to the Speak-easy party in art class instigated by Dolores Kuchnicki, Jayne Glover, Pat Jankowski, Rita Socha, Nina Zawalski, and Rose Kowalski; or the math-munchies supplied by Helen Hulka. I'm just a social outcast! he slobbered as he ran his sleeve across his eyes to dry them. I wasn't even offered a membership in the R.O.O.T.S. (Royal Order of the Snakes) by its president, Tom Kekelis, or the vice president, Bill Gesinsky. Even the secretary, Bob Edelburg, and John Luvison, and Len Koprowski, its members, said No dice'. Dice! Dice? Speaking of dice, something told me Bill Soltis' were loaded when I nearly lost my knickers to him— Not that the students arc as crooked as a dog's hind leg — but. Katherine Cognota finally learned to sign her mother's name (just the way her mother writes it) and Charles Bradshaw didn't do such a bad job of forging cut slips either. Mr. Bopp had Ray Spicwak, Joe Lewandowski, Fred Lauben, John Kuska, Robert Kolar, Leonard Eliason, Gerald West-fall and Joe Koscinski in his police lineup so often that he began to develop a Dragnet' complex. But, 23

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of humor, Vickie Slagcr was anorher one who laughed herself sick when she flopped down in front of the band at a Student Council dance. Ah, me! One band I'll never be able to forget, unfortunately, is the South High School band. It wasn't bad enough that Doris Grieve, Barbara Zup-pan, and Josephine Liparino made like little piggie-wiggies in the mud at John Adams' field, I decided they didn't have the sense to come in out of the rain. Jerry Custer refrained from playing in the band most of the football season, though, because he felt it was more fun fracturing his collar bones. Edith Zullo, Carol Kalina, Marian Rogel, and Par Bobincheck bounced up and down so much when they were cheerleaders that I got so seasick, I couldn't eat the burnt candy apples Joan Lang made for me . . . thank heavens. If I'd eaten them, I might have started walking the wrong way and collecting slivers like Lois Stettin. Suddenly, the trembling teacher jumped to the floor and began peeking under the couch. I thought I saw Pat Kaczymarek, Carole Stawiarski. Julie Ryan, and Barbara Adams snooping around trying to get a story for the BEACON. A zillion other courses they could have chose, such as; chewing gum in Miss Gallagher's class the way Christine Lesniak did, or learning to pick locks outside of homeroom 307 the way Sonya Zawalski did but; no! they had to rake journalism. Ray Krajewski, John Kohler, and Pete Elloian didn't care for any of the civilized courses offered so the)’ tried to blow up the school in chemistry; and then 1 nearly went beserk when .... Talk about collectors, I recollect the time John Owens, Walter Zmija, Ray Tekien and Paul Kub-inski had to help Lucian Lutostanski tot his skating medab to school but Louis Rodgers relieved the struggling quinret by offering them all a lift in his jalopy. On his way there he proceeded to pick up Maryanna Wilczynski, Shirley Tegro, Barbara Sob-odosh, Beatrice Hirt, Rose Mondich, and Dianne Herbold who were wailing on Fleet for the Broadway bus. Half way down Warner, the police stopped them to warn them it was illegal for Joan Smolinski to ride in the glove compartment. Charles Genaro and Frances Glivic had nothing to say about the situation as they were sitting in the police car for violating city code 32196482146-714, not returning signed yellow absent slips.” Without warning, through the door charged three men in white coats armed with a fish ner and bludgeon. They seized the psychiatrist and dragged him through the door; and as the echo of his feet scraping on the hall stairs died away he was heard to scream: Unhand me, you uncouth ruffians. You have the wrong man, I tell you. I should have known . . . this happens every time one of those loony teachers comes in. And they called me crazy, sighed the school teacher as he prepared to go back to teaching his classes at South High School, feeling resigned to his fate. 25