Alvo High School - Oriole Yearbook (Alvo, NE)

Page 31 text:

THE DA'.VN OP A MEW DAY Parents, Faculty, members of the Board of Education, classmates and friends. It is my privilege and pleasure to welcome you to the graduation exercises of the Seniors of 1950. I have chosen for my subject The Dawn of a New Day , For twelve years we have been looking forward to this night. It is our graduation and commencement. Tonight we say good-bye to the happy carefree times of Alvo Higih. Tomorrow we go forth to take our places in the world of grown-ups where we will have to make our own decisions and solve our own problems. We have chosen for our class colors Rose and Gray The Rose is a symbol of the dawn of a new day, a day of peace, a day the whole world is waiting for. I would like to think of the gray as a symbol of the past. We have gone through a fighting war and are still taking part in a cold war. To many of the intelligent people the world situation still looks dark and gray. The world is divided into two hostile camps. One group is fighting to take freedom away from the people and the other group is figjhting to preserve it. People all over the world are looking toward the United States in this struggle for freedom. As a nation we have been doing a great deal to food, clothe, and strengthen the weaker nations of the world so that they will not be trampled down by dictator nations who desire to conquer them. Tonight’s seniors may have to stand braced against such aggressors. We will have to work hard to preserve peace and good-will. We will have to labor for un- selfish standards in business,in politics, and in socie- ty. ” We will have to learn patience and practice tolerance in dealing with people of different faiths and ideals from our own. If all Christians everywhere wore willing to work as hard and sacrifice a3 much in thepro-serving of peace as they do in the preparing for war, the world might not have long to wait for the dawn of a new day, A day of Peace, Norma Jean Elliott Saluatorian

Page 33 text:

I AM AN AMERICAN Parents; Faculty, Friends, and Fellow Classmates: I have been chosen to bid you farewell in behalf of the class of 1950. Tonight another class of Alvo High School leaves the familiar scenes of our school and community life to take on new responsibilities in the world outside. No doubt, in the days to come we will miss our par' ents' and teachers' guiding hands as we face the many problems which we will be called upon to solve. We have chosen for our class motto, The Word Ameri- can Ends in fI Can' . I wonder if any of us ever wonder about the worn American . Do any of us, especially we young people, realize how wonderful it is to be an American? We have 30 many things that people of other lands would call luxuries. Just to mention a few of them, we have plenty of food, clothes, jobs, and opportunities, and perhaps more important than all of these, our free- dom. America is the land of the free and home of the brave to two k ’.nd3 of Americans. The first are the children of those who won her independence; the second are tho children of those who, having suffered oppres- sion abroad, sought her shores as a haven, a promised land. Did the early Americans realize that the word Amer- ican ends in I Can when they started fighting for Independence? Surely, they must have had some idea, since they fought long end stubbornly to win for them- selves end for us our precious liberty . They must have kept in mind the two words I Can . The modern generation should also keep in mind these magic words, I Can . Today our problem is one of win- ning Peace for the world. It is only through a peace- ful world that this precious liberty , of ours canbe preserved. Today our democratic nations are arming, not to pre- pare for another war. but to hold within bounds dicta- tor nations who threaten that peace. Today there are many D. P's coming to our shores to find a haven from oppression abroad. In the past many foreigners found freedom here. Among them was a young Russian by the name of Elias Lieberman. He expresses tho feeling of an adopted son of America in his poem I Am An American from which these lines are taken: (Continued on the following page)